Enclosed is a report to the Judicial Council on California Case Management System Deployment Options. Prepared by the Administrative Office of the Courts IT Director Mark Dusman, it is being submitted as an option list of recommendations of the CCMS Internal Committee (One of the five committees – though this committee is staffed by muppets….) It is reports like this that simply underscore why managers like Mr. Dusman need to be fired and replaced.
Summary of……. Options ?
- Option one ignores the legislature and their role in providing checks and balances. It’s an instruction to push through, continuing to develop and deploy the vaporware and the non-existent portals and 121 data exchange connectors and dms solutions that don’t currently exist without further delay.
- Option two is a pause, much like the current quarter million dollar a day pause.
- Option 3 is labeled termination of the V4 program, which is sort of like terminating a pregnancy by giving birth. It amounts to spending millions of dollars winding down the program, documenting and cataloging the CCMS software and tools while spending five million dollars on studying how to leverage and use CCMS technology (None of which carries any IP value) in the future while permanently expanding the CCMS program management office with new staff offices.
- Option 4 which is not on the table should be to terminate all funding for the program and divert all funding to the trial courts.
In this report, options one and two amount to pushing through with CCMS deployment even though the project requires significant development to design and implement 121 data exchanges, portals that don’t exist and integrating it all with a document management solution that doesn’t exist.
Worry not good citizens because CCMS is complete and all of these other dependencies are outside the scope of the core software.
Please write judicialcouncil@jud.ca.gov and tell them that option 4 is the only responsible choice.
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- Detailed ‘Summary Report’ calls for a legislative end to CCMS (judicialcouncilwatcher.wordpress.com)
- Tani’s Civics Lesson: The responsibility of the legislature (judicialcouncilwatcher.wordpress.com)
Nathaniel Woodhull
March 25, 2012
Option 4 should have been the only option and one that was made available to all our trial courts a dozen years ago. The creativity and advancements that have been lost due to the supreme arrogance of HRH-1, The Empress, and their minions in the Crystal Palace is simply astonishing.
“CCMS” should be a mandatory study for every Public Administration major throughout the United States. It is the system that isn’t. It does not “exist”. What is the true dollar count for monies spend chasing the pipe dream of Sheila Calabro, HRH-1 and Vickrey? How many peoples lives and families lives were adversely impacted by the fact that they were laid off due to the diversion of money to CCMS? Who will ever be held accountable for this monumental blunder? The only ones who really profited from this boondoggle were insider’s friends at Deloitte!
Meanwhile, countless millions of dollars are being wasted to design and build courthouses for which there will be no one employed to operate. But everything is fine now. The Empress has completely re-designed the Judicial Council and the Administrative Office of the Courts is now a model bureaucracy for trial courts throughout the land. Hey, Unionman575, where’s my next bucket? This one’s full.
Stop the Madness
March 25, 2012
Read the report of Dusman. See how Option 3 in this game of three card monte requires the establishment of a long-term office to set branch IT policy? What law EVER put the council or AOC in charge of IT policy? Let the courts buy their own off-the-shelf products…contrary to popular belief, they do exist, and do not have to be invented by AOC contractors. They want to salvage at least CONTROL from the shambles of this project.
Any council member worth darn will insist on option 4 and maybe 5, i.e., get the AOC’s hands out of our pockets and leave us A L O N E. Corner the rat and kill it, don’t give it a place at the dining room table. Option 3 AS WRITTEN is a path toward permanent servitude to some ill-defined amorphous CCMS-lite project. It is a path toward permanent entanglement with Deloitte.
The idea of ceasing V4 is a stand-alone goal, and must be disentangled from any notion of
leveraging what scraps, codes, and artifacts they can get shipped back from Deloitte.
Note how cleverly, though, the AOC has tried to bind the two. Down goes V4, but IF and ONLY IF the other conditions are agreed to.
Council members, if you are not just totally in the tank on this, read and THINK for once.
Wendy Darling
March 25, 2012
As usual, General Woodhull, right on point and succinctly accurate. CCMS, by any other name, or “option,” is still a stinking dead rose, and a noose around the neck of the trial courts.
Recall Tani. And long live the ACJ.
Wendy Darling
March 25, 2012
“Council members, if you are not just totally in the tank on this, read and THINK for once.”
Oh, Stop the Madness. the Council members are totally in the tank on this — the toilet tank. And if any of them could actually think, they would have done so a long, long, time ago.
But here’s the irony — even if the Chief Jusitice, the Judicial Council, and the AOC, were somehow to have a magical ephiphany and stop CCMS, guess what – they (and the taxpayers) STILL have to pay Deloitte all of the money. And why is that? Because, despite having rewritten the contract with Deloitte 152 times (yes, 152 times), the geniuses/idiots up at 455 Golden Gate Avenue, including all those state paid lawyers in the Office of the General Counsel who are soooooo impressed with themselves, never included any kind of a savings clause or stop loss provision in the contract in the event that the system didn’t work, or the judicial branch administration decided to terminate the project.
Which might just explain why they are all so desperately scrambling now to find an “option” to “leverage” their stupidity.
Long live the ACJ.
unionman575
March 25, 2012
“Hey, Unionman575, where’s my next bucket? This one’s full.”
I’ve got it right here Nathaniel. Go ahead and hurl.
Recall Tani!
wearyant
March 25, 2012
Poor San Luis Obispo. I see this tiny county as a pig on a spit, rotating, rotating over the AOC fire. The larger counties are possibly able to stave off the evil empress’s smiling KGB agents and the visiting AOC minions; thus, those counties are vilified and set up as if they were bullies picking on the small counties. Yes, my heart aches for SLO, a lovely vacation spot where innocence and wonder still reside. Until now. I weep for you, once innocent SLO.
I’d like to call out those who keep repeating and repeating the phrase similar to “funds were redirected from CCMS to the trial courts.” WTF! Funds were never, ever lawfully directed to CCMS! Stop repeating the lie! These funds should have always been with the trial courts. I understand why the repetition is done; maybe someone somewhere will start to believe funds were ever belonging to this very misguided, much maligned IT project. Please stop lying!
Dusman’s report is an obscene fiction. I get the impression everyone in the AOC KGB had input into this reprehensible piece of crap of a dense, tiring report. I became a very weary ant indeed in perusing through this pile of garbage and mistruths — Did everyone at the crystal palace pick up handfuls of mud (or whatever) and throw it at walls to see what stuck?
And it’s so heartwarming to see how the hapless reader is led to believe, why, my, YES, it will cost the public SO MUCH MORE to curtail and stop this (monster) CCMS. Why, our simple and gullible minds say, we must have more of CCMS! Please pass the plate with the buttered shit.
Sometimes I hate to be correct about something, something so upsetting. And, that is, that the greedy and arrogant people at the crystal palace WILL NOT STOP in their efforts to get what they want. The legislative subcommittee practically stopped the hearing midpoint and said stop funding CCMS, STOP. The insulated elitists will not stop, as the Dusman report states. The insulated elitists claim it will cost over two million dollars to “halt” CCMS. They have tunnel vision. They don’t “get it.” Even Feuer gets it. Would he be surprised to know his subcommittee is not taken seriously? Oh, well, business as usual at the crystal palace.
ccms insider
March 25, 2012
>What law EVER put the council or AOC in charge of IT policy?
Perhaps the most relevant question going forward. Assume for a moment that v4 fades away and v2 and v3 production versions are given a less costly path forward (i.e. provide source code to local courts). What is to prevent this all from happening again? The need for a statewide CMS/DMS remains a valid one.
>Let the courts buy their own off-the-shelf products…contrary to popular belief, they do exist, and do not have to be invented by AOC contractors.
That is correct, they do. In fact, more than a handful of states have put out bids and done successful statewide CMS/DMS implementations with OTS software. California AOC had the same opportunity 10 years ago but turned its nose up at such low brow approaches. How long will it take for a vendor to propose a statewide solution that can be implemented within 2 years at a cost of less than $100MM? What happens then? What agency takes the lead?
Option #3 really should be a hard stop termination of v4. History shows it makes no sense to pay to mothball something that isn’t (1) in production AND (2) of significant public safety concern. v4 is neither – not even close. The person who made this recommendation should be fired on the spot. What a joke!
Again, the relevant question is who is or should be in charge of branch technology going forward. CMS/DMS needs aren’t dead and it’s only a matter of time until the discussion starts all over again.
JusticeCalifornia
March 26, 2012
It is a certainty that these issues involving who is in charge of what will continue to arise. As Ron George and Tani Cantil Sakauye have illustrated at great cost to the branch, effectively anointing a chief justice– any chief justice– king or queen and handing virtually unfettered decisionmaking power over an entire branch to whomever happens to hold that title and his or her handpicked courtiers– is unwise and unacceptable in this modern, democratic age.
The battle to abolish royal rule in America was fought and won hundreds of years ago. . .
A change in the judicial branch governance structure to include democratization of the Judicial Council and a trial court bill of rights with teeth is necessary– and inevitable. Many (including members of the legislature) have opined that the current version of AB 1208 doesn’t go far enough.
The legislature is not going to want to remain the arbiter of leadership/trial court battles, but it will be required to do exactly that on an ongoing basis unless and until all trial courts have basic protections, and can select representatives to present and safeguard trial court interests without fear of reprisal. Until then it will be “us” (wannabe branch “royalty” and handpicked party liners) against “them” (everybody else).
By now it should be clear to the cj/jc/aoc that force-feeding anything to the largest judiciary in the Western World is not going to fly. Tani Cantil Sakauye does not have a chance in hell of forcing 2000 judges to do what she says if they don’t think it’s right and don’t want to do it. They will simply do what they have already done– fold their arms, and say “no”.
The cj is going to have to man up and take a meeting like the one Calderon suggested, with the goal of intelligently and rationally discussing and trying to resolve the serious “who is in charge” issues facing the branch. If she cannot do this, there inevitably will be further forced legislative and internal judicial adjustments to the status quo.
Wendy Darling
March 26, 2012
Ah, Justice California, if only the Chief Justice could see the big picture. The sad reality is, she appears incapable of it. In her delusional, myopic and rose-tinted view of everything, it is not about the integrity of the judicial branch, or the destruction of public confidence and trust in judicial branch administration, Instead, for her, it’s all about “her power”, as if the authority entrusted to the Office of the Chief Justice somehow belongs to her personally, with no accounability to anyone. From her own lips, she doesn’t concern her herself with the opinions of others, she only acts “to please myself.”
And this, unfortunately, is what we all have for “leadership” in the California Judicial Branch.
And as for the State Legislature, Darrell Steinberg will stop at nothing to protect his buddy, the Chief Justice, as long as she continues to dangle the carrot of an appointment to the appellate court in front of him.
Recall the Chief Justice.
Long live the ACJ.
JusticeCalifornia
March 26, 2012
I am pretty sure Team George bet the farm on Ron George and Darrell Steinberg.
Ron George suddenly retired, Darrell Steinberg is a lame duck, and Tani Cantil Sakauye and Team George — who have been running around with their hands over their ears saying “lalalalala I can’t hear you” just got schooled with parent language from the legislature.
Ultimately, if Cantil Sakauye insists on fighting, the 2,000 judges are going to win the “who is in charge” battle. And I think it is a safe bet that when the dust settles they will not be taking their marching orders from a gambling barmaid or begging her not to pick their trial court pockets.
Wendy Darling
March 26, 2012
With what little hope we have left, so many of us hope you are right, Justice California. But so far, those 2,000 judges haven’t demonstrated much interest in stepping up or speaking out. That burden has, for the overwhelming part, been shouldered by the ACJ.
But even if what you say comes to pass, the damage already done to the credibility and integrity of the judicial branch is immeasurable. And for what? To satisfy the egotistical appetites of a handful of frauds in the Office of the Chief Justice, on the Judicial Council, and at the AOC, for money, power, legacy protection, and self-dealing, and to the detriment of the entire branch and the taxpaying public.
And the folks up in the State Capitol shake their heads and “wonder” why public confidence in elected officials has fallen to an all-time low, and why those that hold public office are held in such disrepute. A person doesn’t have to look any farther than 455 Golden Gate Avenue, where they name buildings and conference centers after themselves, while drinking Grey Goose and eating lobster and caviar on the public dime, using unlicensed contractors in violation of state law, lie and engage in unethical behavior on a regular basis, throw away a half-billion dollars plus on the biggest public works project failure in the history of the state, and ruthlessly retaliate against anyone that dares to question their misconduct, to figure it out.
Recall the Chief Justice.
Long live the ACJ.
anna
March 26, 2012
You’ve hit the nail on the head.
“The legislature is not going to want to remain the arbiter of leadership/trial court battles, but it will be required to do exactly that on an ongoing basis unless and until all trial courts have basic protections, and can select representatives to present and safeguard trial court interests without fear of reprisal. ”
The legislature is not going to want to deal with this on an ongoing basis. Nor do they need to. All they have to do is exert their oversight power. Pass AB 1208!!!
Or declare the limitations of the AOC and the JC.
Which is redundant. The state Constitution speaks for itself.
HRH the 1st and HRH the 2nd, need to be reminded of the limitations of their power. They are not omnipotent.
Until that is spelled out to them by the legislature, they will continue to act lawlessly.
Steinberg and Evans need to have this drilled into their heads and constituents
Game on!!
Both sides of the branch
March 27, 2012
Name a court???
Lando
March 26, 2012
This is a huge week in the battle to restore balance, common sense, fairness , and democracy to our branch of government. All the signs are showing that the JC/AOC will dump CCMS . The next huge question is what will they do with the funds they would have wasted on their failed computer system? In my view this money belong to the trial courts. Recall Tani and democratize the Judicial Council !
Been There
March 26, 2012
Excellent points, Lando. Getting money to the trial courts begins with dumping CCMS, but it does not end there. The AOC is a bloated bureaucracy with many many highly paid consultants, scholars on residence, attorneys, and layer upon layer of managers — all of whom owe their livelihood to keeping the status quo.
Stuart MIchael
March 27, 2012
The voters won’t recall this Chief Justice just because of an intramural fight, even if it includes billions in another state government computer cost over-run fiasco. She can sympathetically whine that it wasn’t her fault, and they’ll buy it. Most of the media still loves her, just like they used to love the Arnold, who was probably visiting the nearby pleasure house at the time.
Unless she gets stuck with some controversial court decision that pisses them off, the voters won’t have a dog in this kind of fight. Rose Bird was recalled because of her death penalty rulings, not because she was as equally incapable as the current chief is of presiding over the court system.
As appealing as recall may be, we should stay focused on passage of AB1208, which was only made possible due to the ever- increasing public voices of ACJ, JCW, and others – hopefully now joined (at long last) by many more of the cowardly judicial “lions” still hiding in their courtrooms and by those court execs who know the truth but are still too afraid of the AOC to do what they know is best for the courts. Who can predict who the replacement might be, or what they do.
AB1208 is the most realistic pathway for rescuing the court system from the hostage takers who’ve been at the helm for so long that they think the ship belongs to them, not to the citizens and residents of California shoveling coal down in the boiler room while the ship continues to sail full speed ahead through the icebergs all around.
Real institutional change is imperative. The only safe harbor is a constitutional amendment restructuring the JC and the CJ, and returning the power and $$ of the AOC to the courts they’ve been stealing from for too long.
Lets keep our eyes on the real prize.
anna
March 27, 2012
Hear, hear!!
None
March 27, 2012
CCMS V4 is terminated….
JusticeCalifornia
March 28, 2012
ccms insider said:
“>Let the courts buy their own off-the-shelf products…contrary to popular belief, they do exist, and do not have to be invented by AOC contractors.
That is correct, they do. In fact, more than a handful of states have put out bids and done successful statewide CMS/DMS implementations with OTS software. California AOC had the same opportunity 10 years ago but turned its nose up at such low brow approaches. How long will it take for a vendor to propose a statewide solution that can be implemented within 2 years at a cost of less than $100MM? What happens then? What agency takes the lead?”
JCW commented on an OTS product already in use by many CA courts:
https://judicialcouncilwatcher.wordpress.com/2011/11/02/the-precarious-position-of-sustain-the-daily-journal-corporation/
Let’s see how quickly the cj/jc/aoc get out an RFP for alternatives to CCMS. And given that trial courts are supposed to be involved in the discussions, trial courts should probably be doing their own research, as Judge Rosenberg did, for reasonably-priced OTS products with e-filing capabilities that suit the needs of their court.
I am not an IT sophisticate, but (perhaps naively) can see a better-late-than-never win-win here. And ultimately that is the selection by the branch (not just the cj/jc/aoc) of a modern, reasonably priced, solid tried-and-true OTS product suitable for statewide implementation, paid for in whole or in part with earmarked funds from the legislature (that would be the carrot). Participating trial courts could get the product without paying for it all themselves, and enjoy lower maintenance costs.
Perhaps, unlike CCMS, this is also something “justice partners” would be willing to support.
Just a thought. . . .now is the time for options to be explored.