Date: 02/22/2006
Final
Dr. John Witwer - CBMS
SENATE COMMITTEE ON -- SELECT -- GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY
| Votes: View--> | Action Taken: |
| <none> | <none> |
12:53 PM -- Discussion with Dr. John Witwer, Director, CBMS
Dr. John Witwer, Director of the Colorado Benefits Management System (CBMS), distributed a handout entitled, "Colorado Benefits Management System Update" (Attachment B). The handout talks about recent changes and improvements to the CBMS program. He walked through the handout. He stated that page 2 is the most important because it explains that CBMS is not a welfare system, rather it is a computer system. Dr. Witwer discussed a court decision that required there be 2 safety nets in place for the program.
01:06 PM
Dr. Witwer continued going through the slides and stated that almost all of the cases from the old system are now in the new system. He discussed help desk tickets where each complaint is given a ticket number that is tracked. He stated that they are close to stability of help desk ticket numbers which serves as a measure of response to computer and policy issues.
01:10 PM
Dr. Witwer stated that page 18 of the handout explains the improvements to the system. Senator Hanna asked if the system has improved from the prior system. Dr. Witwer stated that he would like a study to be conducted of the effectiveness of the system. He explained that it takes longer to enter cases with this system because more information is being entered since more eligibility is being determined. Senator Hanna asked if the state has saved money by combining the welfare systems into CBMS. Dr. Witwer stated that a study of the system's cost-effectiveness had also not been conducted, but that he would like it to be done this summer.
01:14 PM
Senator Teck stated that saving money is not the only reason CBMS was created. Dr. Witwer stated that the money spent to date on the contract is estimated to be about $177 million and that the system is approximately $8 million over what they originally estimated. He noted however that $13 million of that money has gone to the counties to help them to implement the CBMS program, and that $14 million has been spent as result of a lawsuit. Senator Owens asked if the funds that went to counties have been tracked to make sure the counties are spending those dollars on CBMS.
01:19 PM
Senator Groff asked how many FTE are currently in the office working on CBMS. Dr. Witwer responded that 36 people are currently on loan to CBMS from the Department of Health Care Policy and Financing and the Department of Human Services for an overall total of about 60 FTE. There was discussion about what to do with those FTE once the CBMS system is stable. Dr. Witwer recommended keeping those individuals on. There was committee discussion on what is being done to stop the previous non-performance of the system. Dr. Witwer directed the committee to page 20 of the handout that outlined the changes made to the system in December of 2005.
01:29 PM
Senator Hanna asked Dr. Witwer what he would have done differently from day one of the program to prevent the problems that occurred, and what can be learned from those problems now. Dr. Witwer recommended that there needs to be a single and independent point of decision making, the scope or size of the project needs to be controlled, there needs to be an independent evaluation of who is using the program, users must be trained from the beginning of the program, and funding and resources must be maintained.
01:29 PM
The Select Committee adjourned.