Committee debates requiring baseline cost and schedule in IT project reports

The House Energy and Digital Infrastructure Committee on Feb. 19 continued discussion of committee bill 250896, a proposal to change how the state reports on large information-technology projects so legislators and the public can compare current cost and schedule status to an original baseline.

Deputy State Auditor Tim Ash urged lawmakers to “go behind door number 2” — improving the bill to define a clear baseline and require modest additions to reporting — rather than passing the bill as-is or doing nothing. “Without the baseline information, you will rarely find yourself in a position to even know when to ask the question about what's going on,” Ash said, adding that modest statutory changes could give the legislature earlier notice of cost and schedule changes.

Lisa Dockman, IT consultant with the Joint Fiscal Office, told the committee that the most useful baseline is the estimate in force at contract execution and that the committee should track both that execution start date and the contract-cost figure. “When the blue arrows end and the green arrows start, that that is execution start date. That's when the contract work begins,” Dockman said. She recommended adding an “original implementation” estimate alongside current budget figures in the annual report or a cloned dashboard view for public consumption.

Why it matters: committee members and witnesses said current public-facing dashboards reflect an internal project-management view — a snapshot of current status — that does not let outsiders easily compare projects to their original budget or schedule. That gap, they said, makes it hard for legislators to identify when to investigate overruns or delays until after problems surface publicly.

What witnesses recommended - Define the baseline as the cost and schedule at contract execution (the parties discussed the ABC form as a candidate source). - Require the annual report and/or a public dashboard to show original (execution) cost and schedule alongside current estimates, and a brief explanation when projects move off baseline. - Allow the agency flexibility in how it presents the data (for example, cloning the existing project-management dashboard into a public-facing summary) to avoid disrupting internal tools.

Deputy State Auditor Tim Ash told the committee the bill’s changes are modest and achievable and said statutory requirements matter because secretaries and agency leadership change. “One secretary's commitment ... could change with the change of the secretary. That is the reason the legislature puts things in statute,” Ash said.

Dockman described the existing dashboard as an enterprise project-management tool that shows current status, not original baselines. She suggested a clone or a simplified public version showing original execution date and estimated original cost as additional columns. She said planning-phase costs can vary by project and sometimes are material (for example, when agencies hire limited-service staff or contractors during planning), so the committee should decide which planning costs, if any, it wants tracked.

Committee discussion and next steps Committee members asked whether the information should be published annually in the existing report or updated more frequently. Some members said annual reporting—issued roughly once a year—was insufficient and urged continuous public availability, with updates whenever projects slip or on a regular cadence (weekly, monthly, or quarterly). Representative Kathleen James, a member of the committee, said: “What I primarily care about is the original estimated cost, the original estimated schedule ... I wish it weren't so complicated.” She added that the committee receives many reports each January and would benefit from more timely, synthesized updates outside the session.

Members also discussed the modernization fund and the need for clearer appropriation, encumbrance and carry-forward detail by project. Joint Fiscal and legislative counsel will prepare a briefing memo on state IT funds and how they interact with project reporting; committee staffers and JFO will add requested material about internal service fund structures and funding history.

The committee did not take a formal vote on the bill. Members directed staff to produce draft options for statutory language that require the few data points discussed (execution start date, execution cost baseline, current cost/schedule, and brief explanations for changes) while leaving the presentation format to the agencies. They scheduled a working meeting to review options and asked Joint Fiscal Office staff to return with suggested language and a briefing on IT funding sources.

The committee's debate focused on making modest statutory changes that provide meaningful oversight while allowing agencies flexibility in implementation; no formal action was recorded at the Feb. 19 meeting.

Ending: The committee will reconvene for a working meeting to review draft language and JFO's briefing on IT funds before deciding whether to advance a narrow reporting bill for crossover.