It appears the California Department of Social Services is on schedule to soon release the RFP for the California Health and Human Services Agency’s Child Welfare Services — New System (CWS-NS).
CWS-NS, currently budgeted at $449 million, will automate and create a Web-based solution and service-oriented architecture to replace the current CWS system. According to an October project update, a final draft RFP has been completed and is being reviewed by the California Department of Technology. The bid opportunity is scheduled to be released this month (November).
Also, the project stakeholders have submitted another Special Project Report to adjust the project’s schedule, cost and resources. Project management plans also are being finished.
Last month the Department of Social Services said it and the County Welfare Directors Association sent a joint letter to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services supporting revamped regulations proposed in August for state-level child welfare information systems.
“California supports the proposed changes to the current [Statewide Automated Child Welfare Information System] SACWIS regulations that shift federal regulations from adherence to a single comprehensive system to ones that provide flexibility for state participation to develop systems, of an appropriate size, scope and functionality, to meet an individual state’s unique child welfare business needs and practice,” wrote the department and association wrote to the federal government on Oct. 13.
The state’s Office of Systems Integration is managing the CWS-NS project. A contract award for CWS-NS is currently scheduled to occur in Q4 2017.
