TIERS: $425 Million, down the rat hole

Before reading the following articles, you should keep in mind that one of the primary reasons we were told that the old system had to be replaced was that it cost the tax payers $1.5 Million a year to maintain the old system. So to save that $1.5 Million, we have already blown $425 million, and still don't have a program that works as well as the old one does. And so in only 283 years, we should break even, and maybe by then TIERS will actually work.

Audit: $425 million system for social services worse than old one, tests find

08:47 AM CDT on Thursday, April 19, 2007
Associated Press

AUSTIN – The new social services computer system that the state has spent six years and $425 million developing is slower, less accurate and more difficult to use than the old system it is supposed to replace, according to an audit released Wednesday by the Health and Human Services Commission's inspector general.

The Texas Integrated Eligibility Redesign System, or TIERS, was supposed to improve access to state benefits by reducing operating and maintenance costs and improving the accuracy and timeliness of eligibility and benefit decisions. The system was implemented in Travis and Hays counties in 2003 and rolled out into Williamson County last year.

TIERS was paired with another new program that aimed to allow people to apply for benefits online, over the phone or by fax through the use of four new call centers run by a private contractor.

But the program was suspended, and the commission announced last month that it was ending the contract. On Wednesday, the commission defended TIERS, saying, "The new system works."

Inspector general Brian Flood's report included a test that found it took 45 minutes longer for experienced employees to process the case in TIERS than in the old system.


Report questions TIERS computer system
Health and Human Services chief defends system
By Corrie MacLaggan

AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF

Thursday, April 19, 2007

A new report raises serious questions about whether a computer system used to determine eligibility for programs such as food stamps and Medicaid works.

State officials rebutted the findings in the report and maintained that the computer system, known as TIERS, does work. But they are delaying a planned statewide expansion because Texas failed to meet federal requirements.

This decision comes a year after Texas halted a statewide rollout of call centers to enroll low-income people into state programs and a month after state officials announced that they are canceling an $899 million contract with Accenture LLP to run the call centers, manage the Children's Health Insurance Program and maintain TIERS.

The report, released Wednesday, said the commission did not effectively manage the call center and computer system projects, which have cost taxpayers more than half a billion dollars.

The Health and Human Services Commission's inspector general, Brian Flood, recommended hiring an independent consultant to determine whether to fix TIERS, go back to the old system called SAVERR or choose another system. It takes at least 45 minutes longer to determine eligibility in TIERS than in SAVERR, Flood found.

Health and Human Services Executive Commissioner Albert Hawkins said Wednesday night that the report, requested a month ago by 30 of the state's 31 senators (except Sen. Kyle Janek, R-Houston) contains inaccuracies and represents an incomplete view of the situation.

Hawkins said that TIERS (which is pronounced "teers" and stands for Texas Integrated Eligibility Redesign System) works and that it's a vast improvement over SAVERR (System for Application, Verification, Eligibility, Referral and Reporting), the 35-year-old system lawmakers decided in 1999 to replace.

"Why anybody would think it's feasible to say disregard the expenditure of public funds and go back to an old system already determined to be inadequate is beyond my thinking," said Hawkins, who said that the Office of Inspector General did not interview him. "I think it would be horrible public policy."

[My inserted comments: It was horrible public policy to throw $425 million away, by contracting the program to a vendor, and then paying them the full amount before they had actually delivered a working program. It is not bad public policy to recognize that this waste has already occurred, and to use a system that actually works rather than continue to use one that doesn't in order to avoid recognizing that this waste has already occurred.]

TIERS is in operation in Travis, Hays and Williamson counties and was supposed to expand to seven more Central Texas counties this month and to the rest of the state by late 2008.

Hawkins said that the problems federal officials found with the program were issues with staff training, not technology.

"We have no reason to believe we won't be able to satisfy (the federal officials) with the information they need and the changes they request," said Deputy Executive Commissioner Anne Heiligenstein.

The report found that state officials let the new enrollment system go live in January 2006 even though Accenture informed the state that it would use a subcontractor's employees to manually enter data into TIERS because TIERS was not compatible with a software program used in the call centers.

Having those private employees — rather than seasoned state workers who understood state policy on eligibility — entering data about applicant income and employment into TIERS to determine eligibility was a major problem, said Michael Garbarino, deputy chief counsel of the Office of Inspector General.

Judy Lugo, president of the Texas State Employees Union, said after watching a presentation Garbarino made to Capitol staffers Wednesday afternoon: "This is what we've been saying all along."

Stephanie Goodman, a spokeswoman for the commission, said the agency thought it would work to have Accenture subcontractors entering data into TIERS, but that when the pilot in Travis and Hays began in January 2006, the system was overwhelmed with more applications than expected. Backlogs, along with problems attaching payment stubs and other documents to applications, led to thousands of Texans receiving benefits late. The system was supposed to save the state money, but the savings never materialized.

In April 2006, Hawkins indefinitely postponed statewide rollout of the areas served by the call centers, and last month, he announced that the commission would part ways with Accenture.

Sen. Bob Deuell, R-Greenville, who led the Senate effort to request the report, said he hopes the commission fixes TIERS rather than going back to SAVERR.

"I just want to get it working right," he said.

The House Committee on Human Services is expected to hear a report today from a subcommittee that has been studying TIERS and the centers.

The subcommittee chairman, Rep. Abel Herrero, D-Robstown, said he will recommend that there be more legislative oversight of TIERS and the call centers and that the state not expand the use of either until the problems are fixed.

Herrero said he wants to "ensure that there's a system in place that is actually cost-effective, reliable, dependable and not causing anyone to lose the services they're qualified to receive."

A report by the Health and Human Services Commission's Office of Inspector General raises questions about a computer system, known as TIERS, which powers call centers to enroll low-income Texans into programs such as food stamps and Medicaid. Agency Executive Commissioner Albert Hawkins responds.


Report: State officials made the decision to privatize the call centers using an analysis that relied only on pre-TIERS information, even though the commission had already decided that TIERS would be used in the call centers.

Hawkins: It is irrelevant because the decision on whether privatizing would be cost-effective would not have been affected by whether the system, TIERS, or the old system, SAVERR, was used.

Report: The commission decided to award the contract to Accenture — rather than the other bidder, IBM — by relying on a questionable evaluation tool.

Hawkins: The report fails to take into account that Accenture's bid was about $50 million lower.

Report: State officials let TIERS developer Deloitte hand over management of the system to Accenture in late 2005 even though TIERS had more than 500 deficiencies.

Hawkins: The number includes duplications and issues that had already been solved.

Texas Observer: Trail of TIERS

Trail of TIERS

Albert Hawkins is pushing another fouled-up, expensive idea
by Dave Mann


Perhaps the biggest boondoggle in Texas government at the moment involves a computer program at the state Health and Human Services Commission that has consumed more than $415 million and seven years of effort. It still doesn’t work.

Yet HHSC Executive Commissioner Albert Hawkins continues to ignore forceful warnings about the system’s flaws, and is pushing the much ballyhooed software into wider use at his agency.

An Observer review of internal HHSC documents shows that Hawkins has been told repeatedly by federal officials and his own auditors over the past two years that the agency’s new system simply wasn’t functioning. In one instance, the agency even misled federal officials about the software’s progress, according to internal agency documents.

The software is called the Texas Integrated Eligibility Redesign System, or TIERS for short (pronounced, appropriately enough, “tears”). It is supposed to bring efficiency to state benefit programs and make it easier for needy Texans to get their food stamps, Medicaid and other benefits.

So far, it’s done the opposite. In pilot programs, the software has mysteriously swallowed data and left applicants wondering if they will ever receive their benefits. At other times, it has paid out too much money, but how much is impossible to tell because the software doesn’t produce the data auditors need to check for mistakes or fraud.

Flaws in the TIERS system contributed to last year’s failure of the agency’s grand experiment to let private call centers run by the consulting firm Accenture handle applications for state benefits [see “What Hawkins Knew,” April 6, 2007]. The call center plan has been suspended indefinitely, and HHSC canceled its contract with Accenture last month.

But TIERS somehow soldiers on. The state and federal tax dollars it has already burned could have provided health coverage for every kid in the Children’s Health Insurance Program in 2007.

HHSC officials contend they have fixed many of the problems, and Hawkins is moving forward with plans to slowly expand TIERS across Texas. “TIERS is a successful system today,” says HHSC spokesperson Stephanie Goodman. “It provides benefits to hundreds of thousands of clients every month.”

But federal officials and some state lawmakers remain deeply suspicious, and in recent weeks have tried to halt TIERS expansion. It’s not just the well-being of needy Texans at stake. If Hawkins sticks with the software and the project continues to fail, the state risks incurring federal sanctions and wasting even more taxpayer money.

Hawkins didn’t create the TIERS mess, but he has perpetuated it. HHSC set out to build its new computer system in 2000—three years before Hawkins took over the agency. It wanted to replace an aging system— antiquated, but it worked well enough—with gadget-heavy, Web-based software. The new system was supposed to be easy to use and handle every task a state worker could desire, from processing Medicaid applications to calculating how much food stamp money to pay out. HHSC hired Deloitte Consulting LLP to build the software. The project was botched from the beginning.

After three years, the state and its contractors launched a trial run of TIERS in two Central Texas counties, and they have yet to move much beyond the pilot program, which handles about 250,000 clients a month, according to HHSC. Goodman says HHSC successfully expanded TIERS to Williamson County last fall without hearing any complaints. But state workers in the pilot area have complained for years that the software takes far too long to process applications.

What’s given HHSC the greatest heartache is the system’s inability to maintain case histories—for example, how much a Medicaid provider was paid three years ago, or whether a food stamp recipient mistakenly received too much money, and if so, how much.

The lack of reliable case histories prevents auditors at the HHSC Office of Inspector General from investigating cases of Medicaid fraud and recovering overpayments. HHSC auditors haven’t pursued a single fraud investigation among the hundreds of thousands of cases handled by TIERS in 28 months. Similarly, they halted all inquiries into cases using TIERS in April 2005, according to a report last fall by the Texas State Auditor’s office.

Internal HHSC documents obtained by the Observer reveal the extent of the problem. For example, the HHSC Inspector General’s office believes, based on sample data, that TIERS is paying too much taxpayer money in the food stamp program. But without case histories, the auditors have no way to determine how much money mistakenly went out, and can’t recoup the overpayments. Goodman, the agency spokesperson, says the data are retrievable from TIERS, but the system has trouble putting the information into a format auditors can use.

The federal government requires the state to track and recoup overpayments in the food stamp program, and to conduct fraud investigations. HHSC’s inability to perform either task in the two counties using TIERS is not only wasting taxpayer money intended for needy Texans, but also violating federal law.

For three years, the feds and HHSC’s own auditors have nagged the agency to correct the software failings. In August 2005, HHSC auditors recommended three steps that might limit the continued waste of taxpayer money, including requiring a supervisor to review and approve any food stamp payments of more than $125. HHSC officials later assured federal officials the safeguards were in place as early as June 2005. That appears to have been untrue. HHSC auditors have found “no confirmation” of safeguards such as supervisor approval “anywhere in TIERS or otherwise,” according to an auditor’s memo last fall. HHSC’s Goodman says those safeguards were automated in late 2006 and the amount of overpayments issued by TIERS fell substantially.

Hawkins was well aware of the problems. He met personally with staff from the HHSC Inspector General's office on April 27, 2005, and again on September 29, 2005. At both meetings, auditors warned Hawkins that the agency’s auditors couldn’t track overpayments or investigate fraud in the TIERS data, according to a memo written by Garbarino last fall. Hawkins’ office didn’t respond to three interview requests for this story.

Hawkins moved ahead with an expansion of TIERS before the flaws were corrected. He decided to link the launch of the Accenture call center network in 2006 with an expansion of TIERS. Hawkins planned to roll out the call centers and TIERS statewide and simultaneously.

While the call center flameout drew widespread coverage, the failings of the state’s new software have garnered little publicity. In early 2007, HHSC quietly moved ahead with its planned expansion of TIERS.

After HHSC notified federal officials of its plans, the feds reprimanded the agency in a March 23, 2007, letter denying HHSC approval to expand its problematic software. Of course, HHSC has ignored the feds before. As the Observer reported on April 6, Hawkins twice pushed the Accenture plan forward without federal approval. The feds issued a stern warning to HHSC not to try that stunt again. “[The Food and Nutrition Service] will not participate in further funding of this project if the State elects to move forward with an expansion of TIERS without FNS’ prior approval,” the letter read. HHSC had hoped to expand TIERS to seven more Central Texas counties by the end of April. Those plans are in doubt.

You couldn’t blame the feds if they decide to cut off funding for TIERS. The state has already burned through about $231 million in federal money developing the software. (The state tab is approaching $200 million.)

Hawkins told a House subcommittee on April 4 that his agency had, remarkably, solved most of the problems with the software, including the case history problem. He said agency leaders met with federal officials on March 29 to discuss TIERS and that the feds were pleased with HHSC’s progress. “We were able to present to [federal officials] documents showing that changes have been made,” HHSC Deputy Commissioner Anne Heiligenstein told lawmakers at the hearing. “Their reaction was very positive.”

Despite that happy talk, sources at the Capitol say federal officials are suspicious of HHSC’s claims, though they took state officials at their word. Asked if HHSC’s progress had satisfied the federal government, Jean Daniel, a spokeswoman with the federal Food and Nutrition Service, said, “That’s under review. [HHSC] has provided answers to the questions and discussion points. Those are under review.” Federal officials will visit Texas in April to test just how fixed the computer system really is.

Meanwhile, time may be running out for TIERS. Several state lawmakers are losing patience with the repeated failures. Sen. Bob Deuell, a Greenville Republican, offered a rider to the state budget to allow HHSC to update its old computer system as a temporary fix until TIERS or another system can function successfully. Other lawmakers want to scrap the software and make HHSC start over with a system that won’t waste so much money.

The Price of the Colorado Computer Meltdown Continues to Rise

Remember the Welfare computer meltdown in Colorado... well, it seems it's the gift that keeps on giving, even after two years have passed.

CBS4: Welfare Payment Mistakes Cost Millions
Colorado System Possibly Overpaid $98 Million
(Click on the above link to watch the video of this report)

Brian Maass
Reporting

(CBS4) DENVER CBS4 has learned Colorado taxpayers will probably have to pay millions of dollars to solve problems with the state's welfare system. The Colorado Benefits Management System (CBMS), installed more than 2 years ago, has been making more than 11,000 mistakes in an average month.

Critics of the CBMS called the new figures shocking and said it was unlikely taxpayers will ever get the millions of dollars in overpayments back.

"We've always known there were overpayments gong on, but these numbers are new to us also," said Susan Beckman, an Arapahoe County commissioner.

"This is completely unacceptable," said Tom Mayer, a Boulder County commissioner.

CBMS is used to manage the welfare payments for food stamp recipients, the elderly and poor.

"And if we continue to generate claims and overpay people, it's just throwing money away," Beckman said.

CBS4 learned that in the month before the CBMS was installed, there were 349 claims, or overpayments statewide.

In October of 2006, there were 11,300 mistakes and potential overpayments.

State figures show there may have been more than 234,000 suspected overpayments to welfare recipients in the 2 years since CBMS went live. That could account for $98 million lost.

"This system is not fixed, it is not getting significantly better," Beckman said. "We need to pour more resources into it so we stop handing out free money that really people aren't entitled to."

The state said it is unclear how many of the $98 million in claims have legitimate explanations and how many are actual overpayments.

"We will acknowledge we have a major issue to address and we are going to do what federal law requires us to do," said Liz McDonough, spokeswoman for the state Department of Human Services.

Federal law requires the state and counties to seek reimbursements over overpayments. Counties said it will cost millions of dollars to hire more people to sort through claims and figure out what was an overpayment and what was not.

County administrators think it is unlikely they'll be able to collect overpayments from poor and transient welfare recipients.

"If you don't fix the system, it's like pouring water into a bucket with a hole in it," Beckman said. "In 2 years, you'll have paid out another $98 million in taxpayers money and that's not right."

Before CBMS, annual overpayments to welfare recipients in Colorado totaled about $1.5 million a year for 30 years.

County human services departments estimate that over the next 2 years, they will need another $7 million to hire 180 people to work full time to go through the hundreds of thousands of overpayments and figure out which ones are worth trying to collect.

Taking Accenture's "Success" on the Road

Today Molly Ivins (whom I am not generally a fan of) wrote:

"Naturally, in Texas, national laboratory for bad government, we do it all first and worst. We started with this dandy plan to outsource applications and enrollment for social service programs such as food stamps and Medicaid. In theory, we were to save millions - though I never could understand it myself. You see, Texas has one of the cheapest state governments on the continent, but when we hire outside contractors, they expect to make a profit. Add profit, add cost. Oh well.

So the state hired this firm based in Bermuda on an $899 million five-year contract. So far, the health and human services commissioner has been forced to ask 1,000 state employees who were scheduled to be laid off by the end of the year not to leave after all - and to offer each of them a $1,800 bonus to stay. Oops.

Among other errors, the private consortium mistakenly dropped 6,000 children from the children's health insurance program. The state comptroller says the program is "a perfect storm of wasted dollars, reduced access to services and profiteering at the expense of Texas taxpayers."

With a record like that, of course, Republicans want more outsourcing.

When she's right, she's right, even if she is a lefty. To support her point, news continues to roll in about how bad the mess is here in Texas' welfare system. Texas HHSC commissioner Albert Hawkins has received a "Dear Al..." letter from the agency that funds the Food Stamp program informing him that since HHSC did not follow the rules by getting prior approval of their new privatized call centers, and since that program does not follow federal guidelines, that Texas will be footing the bill alone, thus losing a huge amount of federal money that they were counting on as part of their plan to save the state hundreds of millions of dollars.

Despite the incredible mess we are seeing unfold, if you can believe it, politicians in Indiana are suggesting that they privatize their welfare system too, and guess who one of the two bidders are for the contract? Accenture... the same Bermuda based company that has done such a fine job here in Texas. Privatization has it's place, but it is not the cure to all government problems... it can be a cure that is far worse than the disease.

Foxes in the Chicken House

Note: My comments are those of a private citizen, and do not represent the Texas Health and Human Services Commission in any way.

I know it's Lent, and I should be focusing on more edifying and pious matters, but today there are several news items that cry out for comment.

The company in Colorado that designed their ill-fated computer program (CBMS) will ring a bell for those in HHSC in Texas -- it's EDS (Electronic Data Systems), which was the original contractor for the first phases of the TIERS system here in Texas (and has it's hands in other aspects of HHSC). Well now the Governor of Colorado wants a consulting firm to conduct an "independent review" of what went wrong with CBMS, and so whom does he choose? Deloitte & Touche... the same company that has the current TIERS contract in Texas.

Deloitte ought to know a lot about computer systems that cost hundreds of millions and don't work worth a hoot in hell, because they designed the one we have in Texas. The only thing that has thus far prevented Texas from experiencing the same disaster as Colorado is the fact that the State of Texas has kept TIERS in a pilot phase for years beyond the date that the whole system was supposed to have been rolled out to the whole state. It is very curious how three corporations keep turning up with their fingers in the government pie: EDS, Deloitte, and Accenture.

As they used to say in the Ginsu commercials.... "But wait, there's more!"

The Rocky Mountain News has some information on what the Colorado Legislature is being told about what they can expect from the CBMS system when and if it is finally fixed:

“Now, they say, they're just hoping that it someday will reach the efficiency of the old systems. "We'd be thrilled if it approached the reliability of the old system," said Boulder County Commissioner Tom Mayer. "This needs to be the highest priority issue in the state." Mayer, a software engineer, urged lawmakers to investigate whether EDS designed it in accordance with the original specifications or used shortcuts. "Inquiring minds would like to know." …But Arapahoe County Commissioner Susan Beckman estimates that if CBMS starts operating smoothly, her county's social services department still will need 25 percent more caseworkers than it did under the old system.”

So, citizens of Colorado… if you are lucky, you might eventually have a system that works as well as the old system… though it will take 25% more staff than it did before. And ye Citizens of Texas take note, because currently the people in charge of HHSC in Texas are under the impression that a similarly flawed system is going to be so efficient that they will be able to cut 57% of our staff and still produce at the same level as we currently do.

But wait! It gets even better yet.

Back home on the ranch, in Texas, we discovered today that Accenture had some inside connections that possibly helped them get their tentative contract to privatize much of HHSC:

“The commission (HHSC) announced on Feb. 25 that it had tentatively selected Accenture for the job. The Bermuda-based company has clients around the world and an office in Austin. …A week after the announcement, IBM filed its protest with the agency. Harris said state officials could not release specifics of the protest because IBM had stamped it proprietary and confidential. The agency likely will request an opinion from the attorney general's office, she said. "I think with the complexity and the size of a contract this large, and the significant overhaul that is being done with the eligibility system, it's not surprising that there are protests being made through our normal protest process," Harris said. The same day they received IBM's protest, state officials received the letter by Dukes and Turner. Dukes said she received her information anonymously.

"It is our understanding that Accenture bragged to another vendor that they obtained copies of (IBM's) proprietary technical architecture for the . . . proposal, and that Accenture's Tim Overend shared the architecture with a vendor, commenting that others were retaining the information on their computers," the letter reads.

Overend declined to comment when reached at his office Wednesday.

The letter also states that:

•Hazel Baylor, a contractor for Accenture, was the commission's deputy commissioner for planning, evaluation and project management in 2004 and had specific knowledge about the request for proposals.

•Gary Gumbert, the commission's chief information officer, was hired within the past year from Maximus, which has partnered with Accenture on the project proposal.

•Anne Sapp, a commission employee who had attended confidential vendor presentations as part of the agency's proposal evaluation team, is Baylor's housemate.

Attempts to contact Baylor at Accenture were unsuccessful. Gumbert deferred to the commission's spokeswoman, and Sapp did not return a telephone call.”

Anne Sapp is not just a commission employee, she was the Executive Deputy Commissioner of TDHS (prior to the consolidation) and in charge of the TIERS project, and you can see this (as well as Hazel Baylor’s old position) here.

But there is yet more…

Gregg Phillips, another person who has been playing on both sides of the table is also mentioned in todays San Antonio Express:

“Gregg Phillips, who was the No. 2 official at the state agency until last year and was a key figure in the plan to privatize many agency services, now does work for Deloitte Consulting in Dallas, which subcontracts for Accenture. He did not return a call left at his Dallas office.”

At this link, you can see when he was with HHSC, dealing with Deloitte from the other side of the table. And now we see that he is on the Deloitte side of the table.

It is also interesting that Gregg Phillips and was involved in Mississippi's Health and Human Services in the early 1990's, where Phillips spear-headed a disasterous downsizing that ultimately had to be cleaned up after he left. He then went to work for another private company that contracts with government Social Services agencies, before being hired by HHSC in Texas.

How is it possible that people can jump so freely from HHSC into jobs with the companies they dealt with while on the State’s payroll?

The State Law should be clear enough:

“Bidders must comply with State and federal laws and regulations relating to the hiring of former state employees (see e.g., Texas Government Code §572.054 and 45 C.F.R. §74.43). Such “revolving door” provisions generally restrict former agency heads from communicating with or appearing before the agency on certain matters for two years after leaving the agency. The revolving door provisions also restrict certain former employees from representing clients on matters that the employee participated in during state service or matters that were within the employees’ official responsibility.”

What a tangeld web of conflicting interests. The people who are depending on the services these agencies provide are the last on the list of priorities here. Second to last are the State Employees who are getting the shaft in this process.

A reporter’s career is waiting to be made by getting to the bottom of these billion dollar boondoggles (and I do mean “billion”… as they say, a few hundred million here and a few hundred million there, and pretty soon you’re talking about real money).

Update: HHSC leader defends how contract was handled

The Great Leap Forward, and Other Examples of Bureaucratic Stupidity

"Strike the Drum of the Great Leap Forward Ever Louder"
Having worked in bureaucracy for about 13 years now, as I have watched decisions come down from the top that were based on unrealistic expectations, divorced from the realities on the ground, I have often thought back on a documentary I once saw about Communist China’s Great Leap Forward. To make a long story short, Mao wanted to make China’s economy as powerful and as productive as the American economy, so he simply decreed that it would be so. He realized that to produce more manufactured goods, he need more factory workers manufacturing goods, and to get those workers he would need to take them from working on the farms. But he knew he would still need to feed those workers, so first off he decreed that food production would be doubled. The order came down the chain of command, and all the lower level bureaucrats were told that they had better make it so. Of course the means to achieve this goal were not provided, and in fact, the means were being reduced because labor was being redirected away from agriculture into manufacturing.

"The People's Communes are good"
This documentary showed a rally were a series of Commune leaders pledged how much more they would produce than they had the previous year. One would come forward and say “Commune number such and such will produce twice as many bushels of rice as last year.” Then the leader of another Commune would come forward, and pledge to do four times as much. All of this was greeted with loud applause, however, not much thought was given to how this was going to be done.

When the harvest came, all the bureaucrats sent up reports that made it appear as if they had in fact met their goals… but they hadn’t. But operating under the assumption that they had produced all this food, they could now concentrate more on building up their industrial/manufacturing capacity. So it was decreed that each city and village would produce x amount of manufactured goods, and so local officials around China made sure that it was so. All over china, little iron smelting furnaces appeared. To meet production quotas, quality iron goods were often melted down and made into worthless low quality metal that broke into pieces when it was used.

"Everybody is fully occupied in production, the Trade Sector is also fully occupied for everybody"
While all this was going on, the reality of food production started to catch up with those who had bought into the lies, and soon there was starvation all over China.

Likewise, in my time with what used to be known as the Texas Department of Human Services (now part of the Texas Health and Human Services Commission), I have seen on a smaller scale similar acts of bureaucratic insanity. For example, several years ago the idea was pushed that if we stopped doing one on one interviews with out clientele, and started doing group interviews of 30 to 50 cases at one time, we would save all sorts of time, and have more time to devote to other aspects of our business. There were problems of course. All of our offices were laid out with one on one interviews in mind, but since another region had done this successfully, and claimed that it saved them time, it was decreed that we too would follow this model. Supervisors, who were sold on the idea, believed that they could schedule twice the number of people in a week. And in fact, many people were interviewed very quickly, but after about a month I began to notice an increase of calls from people who were complaining because their case had not been processed. This continued to increase, and it became apparent that we were interviewing people faster than we were able to complete the cases. In fact, fewer cases were being processed than before, and gradually we were getting behind. Fortunately, the office that I worked at at the time had a manager who had sense enough to go back to the old system as soon as this became apparent, even though the orders were still that we should be doing it the new way. Our office went up to the edge of the cliff, and slowly back off. However, there was another office nearby that did not have such a manager. By the time something was done about it, the office literally had to be closed. Several months of cases were now backlogged, and it fell on other offices to clean up the mess that was left over the next several months.

Sometime after all of this, I remember hearing that a time study was done, and it was determined that even when done by people who were comfortable with doing group interviews, the amount of time that they actually saved was statistically insignificant. It just seemed like they were saving time because they rushed a bunch of people in and out of their offices at one time, and had more quiet time to do the follow up work on those cases.

Unfortunately, the new approach to doing our work that is being pushed through in Texas is likewise based on unproven premises that are not connected with reality. They believe that they will be able to do the same work with 57% less staff, thanks to the use of call centers and a new computer program that still isn’t working properly and takes longer to actually use than the old program. There is every indication that they are charging ahead with this plan, despite what we see unfolding in Colorado. In the aforementioned minor implosion, there were reserves that did not implode that were able to pick up the pieces. In the proposed model, if it implodes, there will be no unaffected parts of the agency.

Here is what's in just today's news about the ongoing mess in Colorado:

1. Nearly 1,000 Emergency Welfare Cases Still Unresolved:

"Nearly 1,000 calls for urgent state welfare or Medicaid benefits following problems with the state's new computer system remain unresolved according to a report issued by the state Monday. The computer system, the subject of a lawsuit filed in Denver court, has been blamed for causing a backlog of nearly 30,000 people waiting to find out if they can receive benefits.... The $200 million Colorado Benefits Management System went online Sept. 1 even though county workers had complained of glitches. The Colorado Center on Law Policy sued the state after the system was blamed for delaying payments to thousands of residents receiving benefits and keeping cases from being processed."

2. Online welfare system still needs helping hand:

"Six months after Colorado's brand-new welfare benefits system went online, county workers and benefit recipients are still throwing up their hands in disgust. The system has been fraught with errors since its birthday, Sept. 1, 2004. Part of the problem, county officials and Weld County residents said, is that the state didn't test the system first. Denver District Judge John Coughlin set a Monday deadline for the state to slash the thousands of new cases that have backlogged since the Colorado Benefits Management System went live. Counties were ordered to complete applications for 40 percent of that backlog, nearly 30,000 cases statewide. Monday afternoon, Weld officials were confident they met the judge's requirement. But they were less confident the system will be fixed anytime soon.... They thought kinks would be ironed out with training and a better understanding of the computer program. But the longer the system is in use, the clearer it becomes that most problems are the system's fault, Griego said. For one thing, the system doesn't share information properly among various welfare programs, which was the primary reason for its creation....

Debbie Allmer, who lives in La Salle and has custody of her two young grandchildren, said she doesn't want excuses. She applied for food stamps in August and qualified, but it took until mid-December before she received any benefit. When Allmer asked for back food stamps to cover the previous months, she was told she'd receive $12 for each month. Then, a month later, she got a letter in the mail saying her benefit would drop to $2. "I don't care if your computer is screwed up," she said. "We'd kind of like to eat." Finally, the social services department solved the problem and now Allmer receives $170 a month in food stamps. Allmer isn't alone. The system is using up reams of paper to notify people who receive benefits. Often, recipients get the same notice multiple times, or the notices are incorrect...."

3). Counties fear big bill: Food stamp woes could leave them liable for millions:

"Colorado counties are so nervous they'll be billed for millions of dollars in food stamp overpayments that they've asked attorneys and social services directors to look at their options. "We've been extremely worried about the mounting costs of overpayments," said Larry Kallenberger, executive director of Colorado Counties Inc. "We have a growing lack of confidence that the state is going to find ways to hold us harmless." The overpayments began after the start last fall of the Colorado Benefits Management System, the state's troubled new computer that determines eligibility for welfare benefits. As food stamp applications were delayed and renewals bogged down, the state Department of Human Services announced that no families would be booted from the program while their cases were in limbo. That provided a safety net, but it also keeps people on food stamps whose circumstances might have improved. Every month, some 3 percent to 5 percent of people on food stamps become no longer eligible. At roughly $290 a month per family, and with some 100,000 households getting food stamps every month, county officials are worried that the overpayments can reach into the millions of dollars statewide....

4. Number in county needing help jumps:

"...While the number of county residents in need grows, a new system meant to ease the workload for human-services employees and streamline the benefits process instead has hindered the system. Six months ago the state brought online a new computer system to improve the benefits system aiding employees who assist clients. However, La Plata County's human services employees have been overwhelmed, Pat Carlson, La Plata County's director of human services, said during the county commissioners' meeting on Monday. "We have one case worker handling most of the cases," Carlson said. "It is clear we don't have enough staff." Temporary employees were hired to help with the conversion to the new Colorado Benefits Management System that was initiated in September, Carlson said.... Before the Colorado Benefits Management System was initiated, processing a new food stamps case took 20 minutes. Now it takes more than an hour to complete. Carlson is considering asking the county commissioners to allow her to hire additional employees. "We feel like we are fighting an uphill battle," Carlson said...."

See also Off the Kuff's comments on this.