Nov 13, 2009 11:24 am US/Pacific
On The Money: Million Dollar Mistake?
Reporting
Sam Shane
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) ―
It's a computer system created by a Northern California company to simplify the welfare system, but after hundreds of millions of dollars and multiple lawsuits, critics are saying the system is a multi-million dollar mistake.
Monica Rowland of Davis has two children. She's on welfare and gets food stamps. One day back in 2004, it stopped. There was no check for any reason.
"Yeah, we were out, we were out of everything," said Monica, a welfare recipient.
With no money, Rowland was on the verge of being evicted from her apartment. It's not the only time she's had problems getting her benefits. The state told her it was a problem with the computer system.
The system is known as CalWIN. Its price tag: more than seven hundred million taxpayer dollars, and growing.
CalWIN was set up by the department of social services. The concept seemed simple enough: set up a computer system to streamline welfare benefits; make it more efficient. Critics say that's not what happened.
"Oh, there's something horribly wrong with it. It was wrong right from the get-go," said Richard Power a government watchdog.
Power is an attorney who writes computer software and is a self-proclaimed watchdog on government spending. He and other critics say thousands of California welfare recipients have had their benefits cut off or reduced for no reason thanks to glitches in the CalWIN computer system.
"These are all results of the underlying technical problems in the system," said Power. "The last time I heard it had well over a thousands bugs. I don't know how many it still has."
CalWIN has so many bugs and so many problems that lawyers who represent welfare recipients have filed lawsuits to force the state to fix the bugs. In one lawsuit, lawyers allege the system has delayed, reduced or cut off benefits to tens of thousands of welfare recipients in California.
"What's your assessment of that system?" was asked Stephen Goldberg of Legal Services of Northern California.
"Um, it's a disaster," said Goldberg
Goldberg has sued the Department of Social Services over CalWIN. The case is now on appeal.
The CalWIN computer system is being used in 18 counties in California. Goldberg says there are problems in each county.
The 18 counties that use CalWIN have formed what they call a "consortium."
"But the system right now works incredibly well," said Joe Valentine, CalWIN Consortium Chairman.
Valentine says CalWIN computers handle 2.5 million welfare cases.
"By and large, most of those people, the great majority -- 99.9 percent are getting the benefits they're entitled to in a timely fashion," said Valentine.
CalWIN was set up under the direction of the California Department of Social Services (D.S.S.). John Wagner is the director of D.S.S. He was appointed by Governor Schwarzenegger. Neither Wagner nor anyone from his department would talk to us on camera about CalWIN. Instead, they issued this statement:
"We continue to make improvements to CalWIN as policies change and firmly believe that the system is effectively operating so as to meet the needs of both the CalWIN counties and our clients."
Rowland says she doesn't feel confident.
CalWIN was developed by a private company, E.D.S., or Electronic Data Systems, a company founded by Ross Perot in 1962.
Perot, of course, ran for president twice in the 1990's. He sold E.D.S. in 1984. Today, E.D.S. is run by Hewlett Packard, and their problems with welfare computer systems are not just in California.
In 2004, one month before the CalWIN computer system was launched in California, officials in Colorado turned on a similar welfare computer system also designed by E.D.S., and it was an instant failure. Thousands of needy families were cut off for no reason. Angry Colorado lawmakers eventually launched an investigation.
In California, the jury is still out on CalWIN. County leaders say they're working out the bugs, but critics have their doubts.
Power, who claims he could write a more efficient software program, says CalWIN will always be troubled.
They're trying to do some things that are absolutely technically impossible, such has having computers that are 25 and 30 years apart talk to each other back and forth," said Power. "Can't happen."
(© MMX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
Click to enlarge
Stumble It!
Comments