“ Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.”
-Robert J. Hanlon
As most of my friends would tell you, it's very rare that I get truly angry about anything. But as I write this, I find that I am unbelievably outraged. What has me so worked up? How does the idea of $10 Million in work being shipped out of State, and out of Country for that matter, sound to you? How about the thought of $1.7 Million, with an additional $350,000 per year, being unnecessarily spent on Software that we don't need to buy? Well, thats exactly what the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges is planning on doing.
Since early this year, I have been following the SBCTC's attempt to migrate from their old HP3000 servers to a new system. The servers in question are used for storing and maintaining data regarding financial aid, registration, personnel/payroll and other critical information for each of Washington State's 34 community and technical colleges, and they have been trying to get the system migrated since 2005. It's no wonder they're 3 months behind on financial aid, they're using 30+ year old Mini-Computers.
But what has me outraged is not the Project's goal, or even so much the amount to be spent. What has me irritated are the decisions that the SBCTC has made during the whole process, and more importantly their most recent decision as to which Vendors will be awarded the contract. On Tuesday, September 2nd 2009, SBCTC passed Resolution 09-09-20, which names Hewlett-Packard and Speedware LTD.(based out of California and Quebec, respectively) as the Vendors that will be responsible for the migration. Out of a budget of US $10 Million, Speedware is to be paid $4.4 Million, while HP stands to make money not only on Hardware, but also the Software.
According the Agenda from their Sept. 2nd conference, in addition to Hardware costs, HP will be paid an initial $1.7 Million in licensing fees for the use of HP UNIX, COBOL, and HP Eloquence, with an additional $350,000 to be paid annually for continued licensing. If the new servers are to be used for the same length of time as the old system, that will amount to at least $10.5 Million more that they will be paid, just for permission to continue using their Software.
But the real icing on the cake is that SBCTC has not even attempted to take bids on this project. They have been haggling with and cajoling HP to finish this project since 2005, and now they intend to allow them to continue wasting our tax dollars. This decision is based partially on the recommendations of Collegiate Project Services, a consulting firm that was contracted for an undisclosed amount, and whom also (erroneously) advised SBCTC that an Open Source(e.g. Free Software) solution would be one of the most expensive and high risk options. Although to their credit, Collegiate did advise that an Open Source project, called Kuali Student, would be one of the best options for them, however, as they also mentioned it wouldn't be “ready” for implementation for at least 5 years.
And how will the job market will be effected by this decision? As stated earlier, the SBCTC agenda names Speedware LTD., of Quebec, as the contractor for the job, for which they will receive the amount of $4.4 Million. Their responsibilities are to include setting up the new systems, and the migration of the old applications and data to the new system. Why, when we live in a world center of the Computer Industry, would you need to send this contract out of state? Especially when we currently face record unemployment rates. The answer is that there is no sufficiently good reason for our appointed officials having made a decision that will deprive Washington residents of exactly $4.4 Million in jobs, far more than we can afford right now.
Recent estimates have stated that we currently face an $8 - 9 Billion deficit in the 2009-2011 budget. How much of that, I wonder, is due to ongoing licensing fees? Software that is selected by any State agency should be done so based on it's own merit and part of that evaluation should be a factual estimation of a solution's Total Cost of Ownership. In my honest opinion, software with steep yearly licensing fees should be disqualified. They should be disqualified not only because of cost, but because the terms of such a “purchase” do not constitute Ownership, but Rental. Do you want your tax dollars you be used to “ Rent” a computer system from HP or anyone else for that matter? Neither do I. But whats the alternative? Patience gentle reader, we'll get to that next time.
Whats the Bottom Line?
So far, this project has been horribly mis-managed by both SBCTC and Hewlett-Packard, and frankly I don't think that HP should be allowed to continue their involvement in this project. Furthermore, Speedware LTD. shouldn't be awarded the contract for the project without first having to bid on it against Washington based Vendors. It is vital to our State economy that we not let practices of this kind continue. If a private Company wants to make poor choices, its their right to do so, but our public departments should be held accountable for poorly made, uninformed decisions that have such a huge financial impact on the residents of Washington.
Going back to the quote at the beginning of the article; “ Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.” I try to follow this rule whenever possible, and I'd be more than happy to explain this away as such. But there are so many holes in the information that it readily available that I am unable to say definitely that this is the case. In any event, I think that SBCTC should be compelled to offer the contract up for bid, and if they are either unwilling or unable to do this, then they need to be replaced.
I intend to continue investigating this situation and I will report any additional findings right here, so stay tuned. In the meantime, if you'd like to help keep State jobs in-state, and help contribute to the Well-being of our economy, you can contact your State Reps by following the link below. It will take you to the WA District finder, which you can use to determine your district, and allow you to contact your Reps and Senator. Let them know how you feel about practices like these that take away from Washington State residents.
http://apps.leg.wa.gov/DistrictFinder/
If you'd lik e to keep an eye on the SBCTC yourself, their website is at: http://www.sbctc.edu/index.aspx
You can also find additional information on the website of the Washington State Information Services Board, here: http://isb.wa.gov/index.aspx, just do a search using the keywords; SBCTC, re-hosting, & hp3000. Just remember that SBCTC is not the only State agency that has to migrate from the hp3000 systems, so there will be other, unrelated documents.
Well, that about wraps it up for this post. Stay tuned for updates, and until next time remember;Friends come and go, but enemies accumulate.
UPDATE::I just located the Washington State ISB/DIS Guidelines for Competitive Solicitations (Located here) which states that “the sole source method” is one of the approved ways in which to contract IT related work. Take a look at the document for yourself. And if you do decide to contact your state Reps, make sure to mention this to them that this is a bad policy in it's current form and needs to be changed.
