JFAC briefed on SWICAP: how central‑service and direct‑billing charges flow through agency budgets

State budget staff walked the Joint Finance and Appropriations Committee through the mechanics of the Statewide Cost Allocation Plan (SWICAP) on Jan. 7, explaining why central service charges and direct billings appear in many agency appropriations and how those amounts are recovered and recorded.

"Statewide cost allocation or SWICAP... is an actual document that the division of financial management puts together that they send off to our federal authorizing entity," the presenter, Jared Tetrault, said. He described SWICAP as the mechanism that allocates central‑service costs (attorney general, state controller, state treasurer) and direct billing services (risk management, building services, Legislative Services Office audits, and the state information technology office) across eligible state funds and agencies.

Tetrault told the committee that the budgetary adjustments the committee sees represent only a portion of a much larger allocation plan; much of…