House committee marks up bill requiring Agency of Digital Services to publish IT project inventory

The House Energy and Digital Infrastructure Committee on Feb. 28 considered and marked up draft language that would require the Agency of Digital Services (ADS) to provide the General Assembly and the public with expanded reporting on certain information-technology projects, including a publicly available current projects inventory.

The bill’s intent language, read and discussed by Representative Kathleen James, said: “The intent of this act is to provide the general assembly and the public with more transparency about the scope, budget, and overall status of certain IT projects being managed by the Agency of Digital Services.” Committee members then worked through precise statutory language to define which projects are included and what fields the inventory must show.

Why it matters: Committee members said the inventory is intended to give lawmakers and the public clear, comparable information about project scope, budget, timeline, changes over time, and whether a project is on time or on budget. The committee’s work stems from concerns that current reporting did not show how scope, budget or timelines changed during a project’s life and that an inventory could…