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State IT pushes app rationalization, mainframe retirement and tech‑debt prevention
Summary
NDIT and DHS staff told the committee about a multi‑year program to inventory about 1,750 applications, retire the mainframe, eliminate redundant systems and prevent future 'tech debt' by changing procurement and architecture practices.
NDIT officials told the Information Technology Committee they are conducting application rationalization and a planned retirement of the state mainframe to reduce security risk, duplication and long‑term maintenance costs. "The number is actually about 1,750 currently," NDIT Chief Information Officer Corey Mott said when describing the inventory of applications used across state government. Why it matters: many agencies operate one‑off or aging systems that are costly to secure and support; consolidating or migrating those systems can reduce licensing duplication, simplify vendor management and improve cybersecurity posture. Committee testimony described several parallel efforts: a project inventory and rationalization exercise to move applications into a 'top‑right' quadrant (high business value and modern architecture), a multi‑agency effort to retire the PeopleSoft-era mainframe (HHS remains the last mainframe user and the agencies aim to complete retirement by about 2029), and an initiative to prevent future tech debt through procurement language and lifecycle planning. DHS Director of Innovation and System Support (who was introduced to the committee as the department’s IT lead) said HHS hired a tech‑debt project manager and is pursuing procurement clauses to keep vendor software close to current versions: "We're going to try to put in our procurements that you have to adhere to N minus 1 technology... we're saying you get the latest version of your product and you can only go 1 version behind." Committee members heard that some projects are already underway or funded: NDIT has an application portfolio dashboard and is using ServiceNow as an enterprise platform to consolidate cases, grants and onboarding/offboarding functions, and the state is working with agencies to identify low‑value applications to retire. NDIT said the effort will be multi‑year and that preventing tech debt requires planning, an application‑portfolio management tool and governance reviews at defined intervals. Next steps: the committee will receive periodic updates on the portfolio and on mainframe retirement progress; staff and agencies will continue to develop procurement language and a lifecycle management approach to limit future tech debt.
