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Vermont Senate Institutions Committee begins defining oversight, funding approach for state IT projects
Summary
At a Jan. 16 meeting, committee members and fiscal staff discussed where information technology oversight and funding belong in the legislature, risks on large projects such as an enterprise resource planning effort, and plans to invite the Agency of Digital Services and an independent reviewer to testify.
Catherine Dunham, chief fiscal officer for the Vermont Legislature, told the Senate Institutions Committee on Jan. 16 that the newly broadened committee must clarify its jurisdiction over information technology and how the state will pay for expensive, fast-changing projects.
"I'm not a lawyer," Dunham said, adding that the committee can draw on the legislature's independent IT reviewer and legislative counsel as it defines its role. "IT projects get funded in the budget bill. For a period of time, they're in a capital bill."
The discussion focused on three practical challenges: defining which IT matters fall under the committee's purview (including broadband and data privacy), deciding whether IT belongs in capital or operating budgets, and learning from past projects to reduce failure risk.
Why it matters: Vermont agencies are undertaking multi-million-dollar IT efforts that affect services statewide. Dunham flagged a large Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) project that she described as "enormous" and said the Joint Information Technology Oversight Committee recently released $11,000,000 that had been held back. Committee members warned that IT differs from traditional capital projects because many modern systems are bought as subscriptions, not one-time purchases, meaning ongoing operating costs rather than single capital expenses.
Dunham argued the committee needs a durable way to assess projects and suggested using the legislature's independent reviewer, who was hired to provide analysis under joint fiscal in 2015. Dan Smith, the original consultant hired then, has retired and was succeeded by Lisa Galvin, Dunham said. Galvin has produced multi-page independent reviews and an executive-summary one‑page checklist that scores project justification, leadership, project management, financial considerations and technical approach.
Rick Segal of the Office of Legislative Counsel told senators the boundary between committees is not always clear: broadband, cybersecurity and data-privacy measures can touch utilities, judiciary, economic-development and other committees. "Some of these big bills ... have so many different parts," Segal said, urging coordination among chairs.
Committee members raised examples of both failure and success. Dunham and others pointed to early state efforts that had high costs and poor results and to more recent successes in the Department of Motor Vehicles. She credited Transportation Commissioner Manoli for overseeing a roughly $50,000,000 modernization of DMV systems and said that work replaced a mainframe more than 50 years old.
Members also discussed practical constraints from budget rules and bonding. Several senators warned that treating IT as a 20‑year capital expense can be inappropriate because software and service models change quickly; one senator said a system developed today could require major revision within five years. "You're paying over the line," Dunham said of subscription and cloud models, contrasting them with one-time capital purchases.
Artificial intelligence and data privacy were flagged as urgent topics. Senator Ringgold urged attention to rapid changes driven by AI and how state policy should respond, and Dunham offered to circulate National Conference of State Legislatures resources and a prior AI task‑force report as starting points.
Next steps identified by the committee included assigning senators to research subtopics (for example, broadband, cybersecurity, procurement and AI), inviting the Agency of Digital Services and the legislature's independent reviewer to testify, and coordinating with other committee chairs on overlapping bills. No formal motions or votes were taken.
The committee did not decide funding mechanisms at the Jan. 16 meeting; Dunham said she can provide revenue-estimate options if members want them. She emphasized the importance of identifying clear project leadership and business-process considerations to limit the risk that large public IT investments fail to deliver promised results.
The committee scheduled further work and follow-up testimony; members were asked to consider taking lead roles on subtopics before the next session.
