California decides to upgrade their court computer system. Rather than look for a commercial-off-the-shelf solution (C.O.T.S. technology -- always the best way to go), they decide to roll their own. From the Los Angeles Times:
Audit finds officials botched upgrade of court computers
California court administrators failed to properly plan for and realistically budget a massive computer modernization project that has fallen years behind schedule and on which the cost could balloon from the original estimate of $260 million to $1.9 billion, state auditors said Tuesday.
As a result, State Auditor Elaine Howle recommended that the Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) delay moving forward with installing the system until an independent reevaluation is conducted of potential problems with the California Court Case Management System.
The office "has not analyzed whether the project would be a cost-beneficial solution to the superior courts' technology needs and it is unclear on what information the AOC made critical decisions during the project's planning and development," Howle wrote to Gov. Jerry Brown in suggesting the delay in deploying the system at three court systems.
Envisioned as a way to modernize and tie together computer systems operated in the state's 58 counties, the new system has been in trouble from the beginning, and some presiding judges have called on the administrative office and the Judicial Council of California to rethink the project.
This comment was left which sums by feelings up perfectly:
The federal court system has an online system known as PACER. From PACER I can access every case filed in any federal court in the nation and have access to any document filed for a price of 8 cents a page. And when its a lengthy document, they don't charge for every page.
This has been in place since 2005. It couldn't take much to convert the program to handle all the federal courts to handle just the courts of the State of California. PACER is a wonderful tool. We even now have the ability to file all our documents electronically.
This is really needed in the state system. If they screwed this up so bad that it is no longer affordable, that is really sad. PACER is up and running and converting to a state system should have been easy. It is just the hardware issues that have to be addressed. Since most of the court systems in all the counties are online already this must have been done the most expensive way possible.
Once again, thanks to those in government who can't seem to figure out that we the people deserve better.
PACER simply rocks -- check it out for yourself: PACER The idea that California was unable to leverage the use of this platform to their own advantage speaks volumes about the entrenched bureaucratic mindset...
