Newsom signed the legislation, Assembly Bill 156, on Sept. 27 and it’s something of a state government omnibus, covering everything from the State Bar and the Court Reporters Board to sheep herding and debt collection. In government IT, the bill makes notable updates around the Financial Information System for California (FI$Cal) and the Office of Digital Innovation – formalizing, among other things, the latter’s renaming to the Office of Data and Innovation. Among the takeaways:
- The bill, now signed by the governor, revises and recasts, per its language, “provisions relating to the development and implementation” of the FI$Cal system to instead “relate to the development of enhancements to the system,” removing references to the FI$Cal project office from the original FI$Cal Act. The bill modifies the “powers and duties of the Department of FI$Cal,” requiring “specified road map activities” be finished by July 1, 2032. These include working with the departments of Finance and General Services, the California State Treasurer’s Office, and the State Controller’s Office on identifying and implementing “additional products, interfaces and add-ons to the system to enhance business transactions.”
In FI$Cal’s newsletter, Jennifer Maguire, its acting director and chief deputy director, said the updates “represent an exciting new era for the department, and set the groundwork for a department and system that will support the state of California’s financial management for years to come.” FI$Cal’s “final project functionality” went live in June 2021, Maguire said, noting the bill codifies that and refreshes legal language to reflect the project’s completion.
“Along with these changes, the new statute establishes a road map for the department, laying out a plan over the coming decade,” Maguire wrote. “Among these, the road map focuses on continued modernization and upgrading to the system, an ongoing priority that will ensure the security of statewide financial management systems, and a dedication to system viability over time.” The road map, she said, also provides for the onboarding to FI$Cal of remaining “deferred departments, and supporting the transition of the accounting Book of Record.” Work to onboard those departments is underway. - AB 156 forgives a “specified General Fund loan” to FI$Cal “in a specified amount.” Existing law set up “several funds in the State Treasury relating to FI$Cal,” including the FI$Cal Internal Services Fund, to pay the system’s costs including development and implementation. Previous law authorized the California Department of Finance to “authorize loans from the General Fund to pay for the cost of the FISCal system.” And AB 156 alters “system requirements,” including expanding the FI$Cal system’s “state transparency component to allow the public to additionally have access ... to information regarding nongovernmental cost fund expenditure data.”
- Whereas the FI$Cal Act required the California State Auditor’s Office to monitor the FI$Cal system independently during its development and completion, AB 156 places “specified evaluation and reporting requirements on the controller” around facilitating integration of “the state’s accounting book of record.” The bill requires the auditor to monitor and report yearly to lawmakers on the controller’s “progress toward transitioning the state’s accounting book of record to the system” and on completion of the “road map activities.”
- AB 156 formally changes the name of the Office of Digital Innovation to the Office of Data and Innovation, the name of the office’s directorship to match, and the name of the Digital Innovation Services Revolving Fund in the state Treasury to the Data and Innovation Services Revolving Fund. The new office “shall operate as a standalone entity that reports to the Government Operations Agency” effective July 1, 2023. And the bill changes the office’s mission to “that of delivering better government services to the people of California through technology and service innovation, data, and design”; and revises its methods to include using “data-informed practices to measurably improve services.”
- The bill also makes the appointment of the office’s director subject to state Senate confirmation and raises the office’s number of exempt positions to 22. AB 156 creates a chief data officer position in the office – someone who will report to its director and be “responsible for data practices within the state with an overarching goal to improve government data use.” And the bill eliminates the office’s authority to “collect payments from state entities for providing services to client entities.”
