Morrison County commissioners voted Dec. 31 to approve a phased implementation of Caseworks, an electronic document-management system the county's Health & Human Services (HHS) department says will reduce staff time on paperwork and improve client-facing processes.

The board approved the motion after a presentation from the HHS director, identified during the meeting as Nate, who outlined features the county hopes to use in phase 1: autofill for forms, integrated electronic signatures, merge-to-mail and streamlined case-file transfers. "The biggest reason for moving to a new electronic document management system ... is return on investment, and just the efficiency that's lacking" in the current system, Nate said.

Nate told commissioners the system is used in 65 of Minnesota's 87 counties and that vendor support has kept customers for 18 years. He estimated phase-1 time savings including roughly 900 hours per year from autofill, about 24 hours per month from e-signatures for financial workers, and reductions in case-transfer processing that he said would save staff dozens of hours monthly. He described a vendor discount that moved an implementation-line item cited previously at 20% to an available 25%, and noted an additional 5% discount if the county partners with Swift County on implementation.

On costs, the presenter described implementation totals, federal and state reimbursement offsets, and a potential year-one net implementation cost (figures discussed in the meeting ranged between roughly $72,700 and $81,000 after reimbursements). He said the Health & Human Services reserve fund could cover initial costs and emphasized that reimbursement rates were estimates, not guarantees. "I am not going to promise that that isn't going to change sometime in the future," Nate said when asked about federal reimbursement stability.

Commissioners asked about data security, training format and IT burden. Nate said the product is cloud-hosted on a government cloud and that the vendor provides primary IT support; local IT would be needed only for network issues. "The contract also is 100% their IT support when there's issues with the program. It's not our IT team," he said, adding that county IT director Amy Lindorff and the county attorney had reviewed contract documents.

Board members requested additional budget detail and scheduled follow-up discussion during budget and planning meetings in early 2026. Commissioner Blaine praised the presentation and the department's efforts to identify cost savings and inter-county discounts: "I want to say, my appreciation to you Nate for your forward thinking and forward looking to this," he said.

The board approved the motion to implement the phase-1 features as presented in a roll-call vote. The presenter said phase 2 (social services functions) would depend on 2026 budget approval and is not required immediately; the vendor's phase-2 discounts may not apply if the county opts out later.

The county plans implementation meetings in January and aims for full operation by May 2026, subject to the additional budget approvals and the final contract terms.