ALC-Review
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Members, it's almost time to start. if you'll take your seats please.
members please get your seat call the meeting to
Speaker 6
3:22
order thank y'all coach Harry have anything okay katie go right ahead thank
Speaker 8
3:28
you thank you madam chair good afternoon members
Speaker 9
3:33
katie walden bureau of legislative research fiscal division at the very
Chair
Unverified
3:40
beginning this morning or this afternoon we have a supplemental agenda item that was brought by the economic development commission and madam chair
has some comments on that yes um without objection um we need to take up the supplemental agenda no objections good all in favor say aye aye
opposed say nay thank you uh representative vaught do you have a motion
Representative DeAnn Vaught
Unverified
4:18
you're recognized thank you madam chair i move that we move this item to full alc on friday okay the motion is
that this will be moved from here to full alc on friday yes ma'am thank you do i have a second second all in favor say aye opposed say nay all right we're going to move that full alc on friday katie with that do you want to start with item a thank you madam chair the first
Speaker 9
4:55
item for the subcommittee's review today is a contract that was re-referred to this subcommittee last month in arkansas legislative council it is item a1 in your packet this is an out-of-state contract and it's amendment 3 to an existing contract with dhs dcfs with a vendor called evident change this particular amendment adds 375 000 to the contract and it also revises the scope of work and revises the performance indicators to continue quality improvement reviews of
programs yes there are some handouts to
go with that if you'll hand get the staff to hand that out, please. Yes, ma'am.
And while we're doing that, if we'll go ahead and have the agency and the visitors from Evident Change to
come down to the table, because I know that there are questions.
And when you get to the table, will you please introduce
Speaker 23
6:09
yourself for the record? Good afternoon, Tiffany Wright, Director for the Division
Speaker 25
6:12
of Children and Family Services. Sarah Cunningham, Office of Procurement with DHS.
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
6:25
Good afternoon, Dr. Angie Wolf with Evident Change. Good afternoon,
I'm Kathy Park, I'm the CEO of Evident Change.
Thank you all for being here, appreciate it. and katie if you want to
there's that's all we've got to say all right members i know we have some people that have some questions if you want to get in the queue we'll just get right into discussion representative
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
6:57
rose you're recognized thank you madam chairman uh thank you both to uh dcfs and evident change joining us at the table uh grateful that i want to make sure the committee
and I was grateful to both groups for reaching out. We had some really informational video conference calls over the last week. I want to say thank you for that. For the benefit of the committee, a couple things I want to say and then I'll follow up with a few questions. Firstly, I think my overarching concern is that there is seemingly a kind of a vertical integration taking place with evident change inside of DCFS and this contract amendment is an expansion of scope
and a continuation of a growing influence and reliance that the state has on an out-of-state vendor. So my concern is that there's not an off-ramp plan in place and that the vendor is becoming more and more necessary so that DCFS can utilize the services that they are providing us and then grading. From what I understand, the relationship with this contract began back in
2018 when Evident Change was under a different name and has since, I think, in 2020 become Evident change. Can we, in short form, discuss the scope of evident changes work with DCFS and how that
Speaker 39
8:38
has changed since 2018? Yes. So the work with evident change started as the structured decision making tools and safety organized practice so implementation of how the agency utilizes tools
to make informed decisions to provide some consistency statewide around assessment of child safety as well as a continuation of services throughout a child's or family's life involved when involved with our agency including around permanency and how we know and how we utilize tools to ensure safe reunification and case planning also the work with evident change includes the different reports and a data a data system that dcfs frontline case workers can log
into see real-time work that's happening related to their caseload as well as allow dcfs program management as well as executive staff to pull out data and extract it and have reports to present and provide information around our specific data related to caseloads, visits, maltreatment types, all different scopes, some of what you all see when we come and
Speaker 40
9:58
present to committee. More recently, we were approved by the Children's Bureau to lead a state-led children and service family review, CFSR.
Speaker 39
10:10
And part of that is because of the work that we have been doing with Evident Change in order to have a quality review. They are utilizing the same tool
Speaker 41
10:20
in which the Children's Bureau would do if they were to come to
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
10:27
Arkansas and review our system as well. So, follow-up, continuation. So, director, or to the vendor, when we had a phone call this week, the vendor said to me is that they want to put their clients in a position to fire us.
Essentially, we want to do
such a good job that you no longer need us. I don't see evidence of that. My concern is that since 2018, the contracts continue to expand. And with a look through our government transparency website, it looks like we have spent, since 2018, roughly $28 million. The contract values have been higher. It doesn't look like we've executed those total dollars.
But where we're at this year through about five months' worth of contracts look like this year could be even more than last year, which was $8.3 million. My concern is that it's growing. We've not hit an apex, and now we're expanding scope, and our child protection in the state is now relying on somebody other than ourselves. And so I guess maybe the vendor could speak to this since they were the ones who said, hey, we want to put ourselves in a position where we're not essential.
It feels like the vendor is becoming more and more necessary and that we are more and more reliant. And so my concern is, at what point does DCFS become sustainable on their own, or are we always going to have to rely on this vendor? Do you want to do the
Speaker 45
12:08
part about the funds? I just wanted to pop in real quick. The contract in front of you today is for continuous quality improvement, and that was actually bid by RFP in 2023.
So just to kind of put that out there, to point that out, that from 2018, any work that Evident Change has done, this contract was awarded from a competitive bid at that point in 2023. And can I get some clarity in terms of what you think is the expansion of scope, just so that we
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
12:41
understand? Amendment three says, should I answer that? Is that, I'm fine too, but okay. It says, amend to add funding, revised scope of work, revised performance indicators.
And from what I read when we inquired about a month ago, it had to do with overview of hotline fidelity or investigative fidelity. What I understood was this
is scope that the vendor has not had previously, which sounds like
Speaker 37
13:12
an expansion. Is that correct? So that is correct. So we are adding the point
Speaker 39
13:17
of this amendment is to add additional CQI to understand what is happening at the hotline as well as narrowly what is happening around child maltreatment investigations in our state.
the current scope of the current work that they're doing related to CQI is around requirements that we have to have for our children in service to CFSR our
Speaker 50
13:38
child and family service review process and so I see some
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
13:43
other questions have hopped in so I would like to allow the vendor to to discuss the you know plan for an off-ramp and then hop out so others can can jump in but as I understand there's not there's not an off-ramp plan we say we would like to
have an off-ramp but what is happening is we're continuing to grow and spend
Speaker 26
14:08
more certainly appreciate the question and I just have to take a moment to share my appreciation with you representative Rose for bringing some of these issues up and giving us an opportunity to talk about this important work and this important partnership with the division we're very proud of the work that we've been doing since 2018 and look forward to producing more good
work for the department so so that the director can use our work to implement changes and policies and or actually look at accountability issues and training issues and other sorts of things that the department needs to focus on so that children don't fall through the cracks this extra amendment that we we were asked to produce a proposal to do an additional scope of work that takes the continuum of the cases that we are looking at and includes hotlines and
investigations so currently the department has several bodies of work that we are now looking at, including the most recent report that is, I think, shortly to be disseminated that includes cases of youth that had five or more referrals through the hotline, had open cases, but did not receive services from the department. So that's obviously something that the department wants to address and see what's happening
there. a new amendment it's a natural progression of that work to include the front end so we are the department is getting their arms around what is happening in the middle in the back end they need to be armed with information to direct them to what they need to be looking out at the front end of the system I want to let I want
Speaker 53
16:01
to let another question hop in and I'll get back
in queue I actually do have a question myself so since you've been
doing this work since 2018 can you tell us some of the recommendations that you have made that DCFS has been able to implement I
Speaker 26
16:21
think that's a better question for the department says it's up to them whether they take
Speaker 37
16:30
our recommendations and how they implement them I would say so the CQI work began in 2022 so that's where we've been
Speaker 39
16:38
getting recommendations and so the current work is part
of our areas area reviews and so we get a review back from evident change and then we convene the leadership teams in those areas and set goals so evident change alongside leadership within DCFS at the area level down to the county level they set goals and improvement and so some of those have been increasing family time and connection to parents, honing in on safety and following. So we set the goals and they support that through the continued reviews and then following up on those goals that we've done.
And so what you see is in the next review, did we improve or did we not improve and why and what do we need to continue to do? And so we get recommendations like obviously continuing to support the workforce is a huge one, as well as supporting decision-making, leadership-supporting decision-making, then as well as just improving the continuous quality of what we're doing. So when we're out engaging with families, are we utilizing the tools appropriately and engaging with families?
Are we just making a referral, or are we actually walking the family through that referral? And what does that
look like versus just pushing a piece of paper? Okay, and with these recommendations that they've given you and the ones that you've implemented, have you seen a change? Do
you see an improvement in those services? Yes. And
Speaker 23
18:05
how are you tracking that improvement? So the areas are on a rotating schedule for review, and so when we're getting those reviews back,
Speaker 39
18:15
like the second time they come back to review in that period, they're looking at what was recommended last time and did you set the goals and then where are you at now so like we have one area of the state who actually did achieve a hundred percent on two metrics that they had not been doing well on before and so we can we watch that and then also take into consideration what's been going on in that specific county what is you know have we had turnover have we had an increase of kids in foster care what does it look like overall and then balancing those out as we set the next round
of goals. Okay. All right. Thank you. I appreciate that. Uh, Senator Bryant, you're recognized. Thank you, madam
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
18:55
chair. I just want to go back a little bit to the
2018, obviously different leadership at the
department. It was the reason for this is because we didn't have enough staff and we wanted to make sure we were training our, our people right out in the field. And then we built off of that, or did we just want to see where we were
Speaker 39
19:18
and what we needed to improve on at that time? So the work in 2018 was more of the data management work and then it evolved into
rolling out what we call structured decision making. So prior to 2018, Arkansas had what they believed they implemented with structured decision making in years prior. I actually got that original structured decision making training in 2015 or 16 and it wasn't actually what structured decision making training is and now we've implemented what is structured decision making and that work started in 20 in that early 2020 period of time and so what we did was we
actually gave our staff an evidence-based model of safety decision making versus what was happening before all across the state and what we previously had thought was structured decision making but it was not. Can you expand on that does
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
20:15
that start from the time the hotline is called for somebody claiming there's a issue of child negligence or welfare issues and then that takes you all the way through to trying to put that child back into the home or to the
foster system or just expand on
Speaker 40
20:33
the actual tool for me yes so um the actual what we where we started in arkansas was with
Speaker 39
20:42
once an investigation is assigned to dcfs um and using those tools and so we started implementing that work and utilizing the tools and we also had to go back and um get safety organized practice right so putting safety in the mind while we're in our minds while we're using structured decision making tools and so we started that work and then COVID happened and we had to pivot some of that to
online then we had a massive workforce shortfall and then we've just kept plugging away on finishing implementing and so now we have the entire what you call suite of tools which includes the case planning tool I'm sorry the reunification tool and additional tools that go along with that so now it is holistically the whole system and then there's also a hotline assessment tool that was implemented and used there's a hotline tool that was
implemented and that's what we're asking for now is to get that CQI on the hotline tool that was implemented as well as just investigations alone because what the current CQI is on is once a fam like it's just picking that family and that life of that family's involvement from maltreatment report until what the case closes or whatever happens with that family for permanency right and so we want to get the rest of the the system which we don't have CQI
on currently and so this was really about changing our practice who who do who is DCFS what do we do how do we keep kids safe ensure their well-being but also ensure permanency and that's what these tools are about and then how do we make sure that I'm implementing the tools I've led my team to implement the tools appropriately and that's what we're trying to do and so you know there is I know that there's concern about an off-ramp of this but like CQI does take
time and systems changes take a long time like the work that we've been doing has been historically happening since 2016 and it's taken a long time and I know several of you are in here like it's not perfect and you're right it's not perfect and we still have work to do and we're wanting to do that work it just helps to have a outside view of our system to show us what we're doing because what happens is you get lost in the day-to-day work like I get lost in the day-to-day crisis sometimes of what's going on and forget we have to lead a system too and
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
23:16
And that's hard to do when you're dealing with kids and families. I agree, and I also know this is something that is a societal
issue that we're not going to be able to phase out this kind of activity in our society. But I guess to a concern that I think Representative Rose brought up is, are we asking the same vendor to grade their own homework? Is that a concern to you to say, hey, we've designed this tool, and now we're going to see how effective our tool is, and you're going to pay
Speaker 26
23:45
us to do that? Is that a concern? No, it's not a concern because we are not actually evaluating the outcomes of the tools.
We are evaluating and assessing and auditing how well the department is following their own practices, policies, including our tools, but how well they are implementing our tool work as well as their other manuals, policies, and state law. Okay. So, Madam Chair, you pull me
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
24:09
back when you see it to me
in a queue. I'd say I've got three experiences with DCFS as far as constituents. One is it's worked. The child was removed from a bad situation, put back in.
One was it didn't work. The child was never removed and should have been removed. And the other is the child was removed and shouldn't have been removed. Now that family has to fight the judicial battle to fight the errors of their ways. Is that stuff that is monitored through evident change? Because if they've been around since 2018, and these are issues I got called a month ago about a child taken from a home that I agree with the family they shouldn't have been, but now they're in an illegal fight against the state to put that child back where I think the child needs to be.
But that's not up to me. That's up to the judicial system. But the state started that path. Is that something that SDM marked that territory for and
caused DCFS to remove that child? I would say
Speaker 39
25:09
no. I would say that's an example of how we have to continue to evaluate it and understand how we're appropriately using the tools and what like it's hard because I don't know I don't know that any of these maybe one or two of these specific cases that you're referring to but I also think those are the things that we hope to see when we're getting the CQI so we're
like addressing so do I have a person issue do I have a practice issue do I have a whole state issue do I have an area issue and so that's what we always are working to glean to improve and so I would not I would not put that on evident change. Okay, I'll get out of the
Speaker 90
25:49
queue and get back in Senator Johnson you're recognized So I'll start with I guess dr. Wolfe. How many states do y'all work in
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
25:56
besides Arkansas? Oh Goodness 23 states in this in 20. I'm gonna say 23 states. I'll clarify if that is not correct
Speaker 26
26:04
We also work in several other countries, including New South Wales, Canada, like certain territories in those countries as
Speaker 94
26:13
well. Is it in DCFS specifically that you work? In child welfare sector,
Speaker 90
26:21
yes. So how integrated are you in those other states?
Speaker 26
26:26
It varies for states. I think we're talking here today about our SDM tools and where we have components of those.
We also have a variety. We have other, like, justice-focused tools and assessments that we provide clients speaking just about child welfare. Some clients are interested in a couple of our tools, and some are interested in full suites. Some are interested in our data management services and how we are supporting jurisdictions' decision-making by regular ongoing access to data and answering, you know, administrators' questions on a regular basis about what they're facing.
Speaker 96
27:07
So what's the face of the other 27 states
Speaker 90
27:12
that don't use you? How do they provide the services that you provide without contract? They may be seeking support elsewhere. They
Speaker 26
27:25
may have homegrown tools that they are using. I don't know that I can be in a great position to answer what folks that we're not working with are using.
Speaker 90
27:42
So in the states that you're working with, are you helping RDCFS create those tools that you are, or you just want them to be dependent on your tools? We do
Speaker 26
27:57
not want anyone to be dependent on our work. Our work is just kind of across the spectrum is about supporting the jurisdictions themselves to do better practice so that they no longer need us.
Certainly our data management services and some of our SDM suite of tools, we do have clients that have used our work for a really long period of time and have been really happy with us and find that we provide a cost-effective service that they need on an ongoing basis. The CQI work, I would expect this to be, us to be able to provide the entire spectrum of kind of evaluation of what's going well in the system and what's not going well in the system,
you know, once or twice, and then have the department be able to implement changes and assess whether those changes are having the intended impact. So at the end of the day, they're not kids falling through the cracks.
Speaker 94
28:56
So how many employees have you got in the state of
Speaker 26
29:00
Arkansas? We have 11 employees in the state
Speaker 94
29:03
of Arkansas. How many will you have if this contract is executed?
Speaker 94
29:10
that question. So you don't foresee adding another employee for this?
Speaker 26
29:16
Oh, I'm sorry. I think I misunderstood your question. I don't envision adding – I don't know the answer to that question. I think we have 11 employees currently in the state of Arkansas. We do like to have a strong connection to any jurisdiction that we're working with
Speaker 90
29:38
and having folks very familiar with that system. Do you have other employees in your system that work on these things for the state of Arkansas besides those 11?
Speaker 26
29:50
Sure. We have employees that work on the safe managers, the data management services, data analytics. Most of those folks are based out of the Midwest. So,
Speaker 90
30:03
Ms. Wright, so best I could pull up is we have just over 1,100 employees right now in DCFS. Is that pretty close? Yeah, that's pretty close. So, and I know the turnover has hopefully gotten better.
Speaker 107
30:22
Is that accurate? I don't have an answer for that yet. We're watching.
Speaker 40
30:30
I think we're trying to be strategic before we say yes or no on the turnover and probably in the next couple of months be able to really understand how the pay plan impacted
Speaker 90
30:44
turnover. So how much one-on-one interaction with those 1,100 employees do you have with the foster? I think we have like 3,500 foster in Arkansas and cases pending probably more than that.
can you say that question one more time i'm sorry one-on-one uh i mean with those 1100 employees how much of those are dedicated to you know the foster you
Speaker 40
31:17
would say there's less than 100 in our main office downtown um probably most of our work is the staff across the state and the county
Speaker 90
31:27
offices doing the work so administratively do you think
that that you can take the best practices that is given through evidence changing and in-house in-house this because i think you've got almost 250 positions that are not filled i mean could you could you foresee in the future doing this yourself rather than having to contract and use you know the 20 28 million dollars over the last you know eight years
Speaker 37
32:03
i don't think i can answer that right now um currently today i have 101 vacant budgeted positions um those
Speaker 39
32:11
almost all of those are out on the front lines um the reviews the review team would have to be in our main office and right now um that team does review some investigations some foster care cases but they're also managing programs and contracts so i don't think i can give you an answer on that right now um but i wouldn't want to
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
32:37
that today i can answer that all right thank you representative rose you're recognized thank you madam chair
uh first i want to say appreciate the committee i know not everybody's uh been uh deeply entrenched in this uh until recently so i appreciate uh the patience uh director wright I also appreciate your work, um, your sincerity in this. I know this is deeply personal. Um, and I kind of want to pivot to that for just a minute as it has become deeply personal
for me, um, more so since we first started having some of these conversations over the last couple of months, um, I've had numerous families and concerned individuals, organizations reach out just about the work that they're doing or children that are in danger or similar to what Senator Bryant said families who maybe have had children taken incorrectly from their homes most recently I spoke to family members of the children involved in that Baxter County case
and family members of that child who was abused over the course of 11 years and then parents of siblings of that child who was also sexually assaulted by the same abusers. In a committee meeting a couple of months ago, we had a very good discussion that led, I think you guys did some great work, discovering in addition to that Baxter County case, there were 341 other similar cases, and at least eight of those have been referred out
for investigation or law enforcement or something along those lines. I think what I am concerned with is we have found and see that there are cracks in the work. And we are saying we've got this vendor who each year we continue to spend more money with, more services, more scope, 11 employees in the state, and we are in a situation where they're assessing the performance
and the fidelity of systems that they help build, that they help improve, or they help implement, or they help train. And we continue to give them more money, and nobody ever says, maybe we should look at our own division. Maybe Director Wright and her team have the answers. And my concern is we've been funding this vendor, we've discovered this issue, we're digging into it, but maybe it could be a lapse in the system that we're utilizing. Maybe it needs to be something done internally, because I think the problem, and this is the question I want to go to, at what point does the division in our state's reliance on a single out-of-state vendor become a risk to institutional dependence and then capping ourselves internally?
Speaker 39
35:49
I think that, well, so one part of that question is we have to continue to assess, but also pivot when necessary. I think that what's one thing with child welfare is it's continually evolving, society's continuing to evolve. The families we're serving are complex. it feels like families are continuing to become even more complex.
And so how do we continue to serve, and what does that mean? And so I think that's where together we continued to evaluate what is happening, what information we have, and how we pivot the system appropriately as things continue to change and evolve. We have, I'm sure some of you all are aware, but there's new rules that are coming from the Children's Bureau or the Administration of Children and Families.
And so we're going to have to pivot and understand what those rules are and evaluate where those fit into Arkansas. There's a lot of happening right now. Also, most recently, Representative Bentley had her ISP passed, and I think that will also be pivotal to the work. but I think the CQI will enhance that work as well with that Representative Bentley got approved last week at committee. So I just think it's never a conversation you stop.
Child welfare continues to evolve. It looks different, and so how do we continue to evolve with the system as the system changes? And I don't necessarily know if I'm answering your question entirely, But I can't say in six months from now, maybe we're saying we've
Speaker 120
37:47
got to go a different direction and we've got to figure out how do we pivot that.
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
37:58
And so how do we balance that out? Sure, and I appreciate that. And, you know, last year we spent $8.3 million with evident change, and that was data, medical consulting, and consulting.
And this is what is listed on the amount spent for 2025 under transparency.arkansas.gov. Sir,
Speaker 51
38:19
we don't actually provide the medical. I'm not sure
Speaker 26
38:23
what you're referring to there. We appreciated this question was brought up to us earlier in the week, and we have checked our records. The department has paid us since 2018 approximately $12 million. All I can
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
38:39
say is I'm looking at a copy of proof of service contract valid through May 31 of 2026.
And it's on our government transparency website. So if there's even confusion in who we're paying and what we're paying for, that may be a whole other rationale to press pause while we look into that. I don't know, but I can say with authority that our transparency website for the state lists $8 million plus for last year. So if there's something haywire there, we should figure that out too. But that's what's listed, amounts spent.
So whatever the number is, again, my growing concern is that we're continuing to lean on somebody other than ourselves, and we've been doing it for quite a long time and we are seeing this circular accountability which leaves a lot of room for holes because we're not judging evident changes work they're judging our work and that's concerning I'll hop out and let somebody else jump in thank you i'm over here
Senator Bart Hester
Unverified
40:03
it needs to go to evident change
again how many people do what
you do i mean is there are there 50 companies in the country are there three
Speaker 131
40:20
how many people do this type of work we are the developers of structure decision-making and safety organized practice and team decision making so we have we are the only organization that provides those specific services as well as safe measures which is the subscription-based
data reporting analytics service so if we did an RFP you were the
Senator Bart Hester
Unverified
40:41
only person that bid I don't know how the
Speaker 131
40:45
RFP was written I don't recall that if that was more generic around that service we had a service that we felt was responsive to what was outlined in the RFP and so submitted a
Senator Bart Hester
Unverified
40:57
response good director right the if if if we came to you in the fiscal session I said hey I'm gonna give you 20 new positions uh to do this work can you do this work or is it something you think
is necessary to have a third party doing
Speaker 37
41:14
the review in my opinion the third party review helps because it's a outside view looking into
Speaker 39
41:19
the system at all the moving pieces of the system going on um i mean i can review an investigation but they're going to look at the whole picture And I value that we get an outside perspective, just like when you all, just like when I come to committee and I'm presenting you all data reports and you ask me about specific data and I get a good question that I hadn't completely thought of, I go back and process through that, right?
Speaker 116
41:46
And so I think that leads to continuing to grow how we think
Speaker 26
41:56
and evolve as an agency. That's all I have. Thank you. Just to add to that, my understanding was that we were one of three organizations that responded to the RFP on the CQI work, and
there was a peer review process associated with that. And just for clarification
for Representative Rose, both DCFS and Evident-based both show that they have spent $11.6 million,
about $12 million. So I don't know where the disconnect is with the transparency. So I've asked staff that if they will look into that and tell us where the difference is at. So hopefully they'll be able to get that to us. But for what they're able to show and what the company shows is $12 million. So there's some disconnect in the transparency. So they're going to get that information for
Chair
Unverified
42:47
us just for clarification. Senator Bryant, you're recognized. Thank
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
42:50
you, Madam Chair, do you know how quick that information might be available?
They're working on it now, so hopefully by tomorrow we'll have that information. By Friday, for sure, we'd have that
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
43:06
information. Thank you. I think I'm just going to go on my concerns, probably mirror a lot with Representative Rose. The
contracts just become the beasts of their own, and they just, you have to keep feeding that beast, And the beast has to figure out how to become relevant and to continue to grow the beast. I think that's proof that, like any good organization, they hire lobbyists to sway the legislature on their interests.
I've gotten calls from that for this. And that is, again, my concern is we don't have an off-ramp. If the answer is we're going to use this software and this team in perpetuity until the next governor makes a systematic or sweeping change in how the state of Arkansas does business, that's the answer i want i don't want to see just continue going back to the well for more money for the same vendor to do the same things that may or may not be working because i got constituents to say the system doesn't work i've got colleges with employees calling me telling me that they are
part of the dcfs tool and it is not working and it is just a machine that perpetually feeds itself in the interest of preserving uh jobs in the market and so i again i would like to know madam chair if if the answer is 12 million over six years or the
answer is 25 or 50 million over six years because that's a that's an impactful number yes senator
Speaker 149
44:29
bryant they're working on that and like i
said we'll have that hopefully by tomorrow if not for sure before friday uh
Representative Bladyman, you're recognized. Representative Rose,
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
44:49
you're recognized. Again, I want to say I appreciate everybody
at the table taking the time to speak with me prior to and enduring today's committee meeting. I'm sure this went longer than most folks would like. My overarching theme, I think, has been expressed and my encouragement to this committee would be for the first time since we've entered into this contract since 2018 that maybe it's
appropriate to just press pause instead of expanding and say let's give DCFS the option to look internally to their team to their qualified professionals director right you've obviously been promoted through the ranks you've done the work from the bottom to the top you've got the confidence of the Secretary of DHS to maybe resolve these issues and find these problems. Pausing or not implementing this contract doesn't remove the evident change vendor from the work
they're already doing, but it is my opinion, based on the last several months, that maybe it's not the best thing to continue expanding. And so I will just leave it at that and say thank you, Madam Chair, for the liberty today thank you members do we have any other questions
seeing none i have a motion do pass uh senator bryant yeah thank
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
46:14
you madam chair i guess since the motion's on substitute motion to
hold this to the end of the meeting to see if those numbers come back if somebody's staff is working on that okay so you're
wanting your motion is to hold it until friday motion or even hold it
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
46:27
till the end of this meeting to see if those numbers come back they won't have it by the end of
this meeting okay then my motion would be to hold it till friday okay we have a substitute motion which is to hold it until friday do i have a second got
a second all in favor say aye opposed say nay
the eyes have it this will be moved to friday's agenda thank y'all for coming with that we're going to go down to item
Speaker 9
47:02
b methods of finance thank you madam chair item b in your packet are the methods of finance on the first page you'll see a cover letter submitted from mr daniel brassert of dfa office of accounting presenting seven methods of finance for your review today on the next page you'll see a summary schedule staff created of these methods
of finance and i'll go over them with you quickly now number one and number two are both with asu jonesboro the first one is for a library chiller renewal they state they want to fund this project with renewal replacement educational and general funds and they estimate the original cost to be be $836,000. Number two, also with ASU Jonesboro, this is for Pavilion American Disability Act improvements. This is increasing an existing method of finance to $833,000 using university
reserves. Number three, HSU, this is for track restoration project. It is a new MOF for $850,000 and they will finance this project using tuition fees and auxiliary profits. Number four, U of A Fayetteville. This is the Oak Ridge Trail Extension. This is a new method of finance to create a paved concrete trail between, to trail the wooded hillside between Razorback Stadium and the Arkansas Union. They're using a grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
and they estimate it'll cost $620,000 initially. Number five, six, and seven are all with UAMS for various projects. Number five is for a central endoscopy procedure room renovation. This is to increase this existing facility by 350 square feet. They estimate it will be $1 million using UAMS revenues. Number six, this is for operating room renovations. This is estimated to cost $4.6 million also using UAMS revenues. The last method of finance with UAMS is for the
spine institute first floor neurosurgery and spine clinic renovation this will be for about 4,200 square feet they estimate it to cost 1.9 million dollars and they will use revenues and foundation and donor funds these are the methods of finance for your review today thank
you any questions members on b1 two three four five six or
seven seeing none do i have a motion for review motion second second all in favor say aye poll say nay
congratulations we're going to move down to item C which are going to be discretionary
Speaker 9
49:39
grants thank you madam chair item C1 is one discretionary
Speaker 162
49:43
grant we received from the Department of Health this is a federal grant for eight hundred and thirty one thousand dollars to the Arkansas Foundation for medical care this is for implementation of the personal responsibility education program which is for at-risk youth in schools and those in transitional services it promotes
Chair
Unverified
50:04
abstinence healthy relationships and sti education this is the discretionary grant from
the department of health members any questions seeing none you want to move
Speaker 9
50:15
to c2 please yes ma'am item c2 are the discretionary grants we received from dhs for this month there are 30 here for your review but several of them are for like purpose so if it's okay with the subcommittee i will group those for you the first eight grants are with dhs division of
Speaker 162
50:33
aging adults and behavioral health services these are all a shared federal state grant allocations and they are for is to
distribute funding between senior citizen center swap funds and senior citizen center restricted reserve funds for programs and services that improve the quality of life of
Speaker 9
50:53
older Arkansans in various locations throughout the state. So this is discretionary grants one through eight. So that takes us to item C, page four, and we'll begin at number nine. The next grant is for DHS, Division of Children and Family Services. This is a federal grant for
$3 million to recruit and retain resource parents and to provide tangible supports to children and families impacted by foster care. And this is to a grantee called the contingent. The next group is also with DHS, DCFS. This is going to be grants 10 through
Speaker 162
51:33
15. And these are all federal grants that are for evidence-based services to children and adults who are experiencing human trafficking trafficking in the
Speaker 9
51:42
state. That takes us over to page seven in item C, and we begin with grant
Speaker 162
51:49
number 16 through number 26. These are all discretionary grants from DHS, Division of Medical Services, and these are for Rehabilitative Day Program Assistant Grants. This assists adults with serious mental illness with long-term
Speaker 9
52:06
recovery and self-sufficiency by promoting community integration helping them build connections and engage in their local communities so that's grant 16 through 26.
and that takes us over to item c page 10 and number 27 we had dhs division of youth services with sankofa learning academy this is a federal grant for academic enrichment support to to academically at-risk students in the Glenview community. Discretionary grant number 28, DHS, Division of Youth Services with SIL Educational Consulting. This is a $30,000 grant for students at Dunbar Middle School
with leadership, emotional intelligence, and conflict resolution skills. Number 29, DHS, DYS. This is a $30,000 grant for a job readiness program targeting at-risk youth and also for college and career readiness activities. And finally, number 30 with DHS-DYS with Bow Reading Consultants. This is also a $30,000 grant, and it pairs adult volunteers, older students, and elementary readers to
Speaker 162
53:16
strengthen literacy skills, build positive relationships, and reduce risks.
These are the discretionary grants from DHS, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Senator Bryant, who's your question for? Division on Aging
Adults. Yes, can we have someone come down from the department, please? And if
Speaker 168
53:40
we would introduce yourself for the record. Jay
Speaker 170
53:51
Hill, director for aging and adult services with DHS.
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
53:55
Go ahead, Senator. Thank you. Thank you, sir, for being here. I just, I think my call volume has increased on adults with disabilities. And I'm just reading, when I read this report, amend that funding in these accounts for older Arkansas and adults with disabilities. Can you tell me, with
the title being Area Agency on Aging, so when I'm telling them to refer to them for state services, that name does not come into my mind. Then when I saw adults with disabilities, Can you tell me the definition that the agency has, the purview to fund or help assistance for, say, a 45-year-old with a disability?
Speaker 172
54:35
Yes. So those are two different things. The funding that you see here go to the, or to support senior centers, this is a $2 million restricted reserve request, and then the first $500,000 GR that is swept from the agency at the end of each fiscal year supports senior centers. That's a statutory allocation that goes back to the center. So these funds support the activities such as meal services, transportation services, socialization, and local senior centers.
The services I believe you're referring to are, for instance, the waiver services, the home and community-based type services that we offer through programs at the
Speaker 173
55:16
division that are Medicaid programs. I think it's more of a broad question. If
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
55:22
I were to get a constituent that has an adult with disabilities in the home and there's not enough bed space being built or being utilized to provide services, is this an avenue that they could
go request services from through the area centers of aging?
Speaker 172
55:39
Yes, there are some services that they provide. The AAAs do fund, for instance, personal care. They do fund some services. They assist, some of our AAAs can assist our beneficiaries with some of the furnishings, the appliances they may need in their home. Transportation to medical appointments, absolutely. There are supportive services under the Title 3B as well as family services under Title 3E that do support individuals in the home that do have needs. Okay, and that's in
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
56:08
addition to the Medicaid services or Medicare services?
Speaker 172
56:11
That's in addition to, right, that's separate from. And I'm happy to help make connections if you have individuals in your area that you'd like to connect. I
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
56:18
would. I appreciate that. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Madam
Chair. Thank you. Any other questions, members? Seeing none, I need a motion for review of one and two. Have a motion second. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Poe, say nay. Congratulations. We're going to move down to item D now, which are going to be the service contracts. Thank you, Madam Chair. In item D.
Speaker 9
56:43
portion of your packet these are the contracts and rfqs submitted for your review today on the first page you'll see a letter we received from the osp director miss jessica patterson she states that all the contracts
Speaker 162
56:56
and rfqs presented today were reviewed by her staff and were found to be procured correctly and under law also as requested by legislative council they identified two contracts that were previously procured using the
Speaker 9
57:09
traditional or the most advantageous proposal method and I want to bring to the committee's attention the second one that is mentioned here
in the table with the Department of Military they contacted us prior to the meeting and requested for this contract to be pulled so it is not under consideration today and you'll see that later in the packet I'll point out to you so technically the only one that you'll see today is the UCA contract with leapfrog technologies also in this letter you'll see that they provide an update about their their review and creation of the revised rules in response to section 19 of act 782 they state that that they have completed their work with acaso to review and revise portions
of the procurement rules and that the governor's office is reviewing them and once the governor's office reviews those final rules osp will begin the promulgation process so moving to the rfq for this month that's under item d1
Speaker 162
58:07
we have one for this month it is with disability determination social security administration this is a 1.2 million dollar rfq for medical consultant services for case processing and
Chair
Unverified
58:18
reviews that's the one rfq for your review today
any questions members seeing none do i have a motion for a second
all in favor say aye opposed say nay congratulations we're going to move down to d2 construction related contracts thank you
Speaker 162
58:39
madam chair on page four of your d packet you'll see the construction related contracts for your review today there are seven of them the first one is with arkansas tech with miller boskus and lack architects this is a new contract for on-call
architectural services for the university number two department of health with batson incorporated this is a new original contract for professional engineering and architectural design services for department of health number three with northwest arkansas community college with core architects this is amendment one to an existing contract to increase and add time to to this contract for schematic design services design development and construction documents number four on the next page also with nwac this is a contract with crossland construction this is a
a new contract for $7.1 million, and this is relating to renovations on the NWAC Benton County campus to provide repairs and renovations from the May 2024 tornado. Also, number five with NWAC with SCM Architects. This is an architectural services contract for schematic design services, design development, and construction services. Number six with the University of Arkansas with core architects this is amendment one to an existing contract this is increases this contract
about 8.4 million dollars and it is for full design services for the maple hill north student housing project number seven with university of arkansas with seals construction incorporated this is amendment two to an existing construction contract for services provided with the arkansas school for mathematics sciences and arts and this particular amendment is relating to infrastructural improvements that the school needs to make this includes concrete paving stormwater structures and road widening these are the construction contracts madam chair thank you members who
have any questions seeing none to have a motion for review second
all in favor say aye poll say nay congratulations now we're going to move down to item d3
Speaker 162
1:00:46
intergovernmental contracts thank you madam chair there is one intergovernmental contract for your review today it is between the UA Little Rock and Arkansas Tech University. This is an original contract for $65,000 and it is for provision of entrepreneurial and small business services to the designated geographic
territory. This is federally funded by the U.S. Small Business
Chair
Unverified
1:01:08
Administration just for the Arkansas Small Business and Technology Development Center. This is the intergovernmental contract. Thank you.
Members, any questions? Seeing none, do I have a motion to review? Second, All
in favor, say aye. Poll say nay. All right. Thank you. We're going to move down to item D4,
Speaker 162
1:01:28
which is out-of-state contracts. Thank you, Madam Chair. The first contract in out-of-state contracts is for Arkansas teacher retirement with State Street Bank and Trust Company. This is Amendment 12 to an existing contract, and it expands the scope of this existing contract to provide for the extension of four foreign markets
in the management and attendance services, trade settlement, safekeeping, and reporting of domestic and international securities for the teacher retirement investment system. Number two, Department of Commerce with AEDC with Michael Baker International. This is Amendment 1 to an existing contract. It increases the contract by $3.6 million. This is for professional services for broadband grants, systems, and services. Number three, Department of Education with the college entrance exam board. This is amendment one to an existing contract and it is to provide
for Arkansas schools to offer the PSAT to selected grades if chosen by students for the spring of 2026. Number four, Department of Health with Waystar Incorporated. This is amendment three to an existing contract and this is for clearing house services provided by Waystar. This includes verifying claim eligibility transmitting EDI information compliant claims and management number five with DHS and Deloitte this is a new special
procurement contract it is originally established at 110 million dollars and since this is a special procurement it's the first time the committee seeing it
Speaker 9
1:03:06
we provided this special procurement justification letter in your green packet today so you'll see that attached to your packet and
Speaker 162
1:03:16
this is to establish a contract with initial term of three years for the maintenance and operation of the Arkansas integrated eligibility system for DHS number six DHS division of aging adults and behavioral health with med sphere
systems corporation this is another original special procurement so you'll see these letters second in your green packet this original contract is to initiate an agreement for the state hospital electronic health records and patient billing system number seven dhs with dcfs premier biotech incorporated this is amendment four to an existing contract for drug screen confirmations and drug challenges for fy27 number eight dhs dcfs with timothy hill children's ranch this is an original contract for a qualified residential treatment
program number nine DHS division of medical services with guide house incorporated this is amendment 10 to an existing contract to add funds for the assistance with preparation training and review of the completion of centers for Medicare number 10 on page 12 of packet D we have DHS division of medical services with guide house incorporated this is also a special procurement that you're seeing for
the first time so they're the third set of letters in your green packet is about this guide house contract this contract is originally established at two million dollars and is for the assistance with preparation training and review of the completion of the centers for medicare and medicaid services number 11 dhs dms with health management systems this is amendment one to an existing contract for automated data matching systems. Number 12 DHS division of medical services with health management systems is amendment two to an existing contract and this
is for the Arkansas health insurance premium payment program. Number 13 DHS DMS with Verita incorporated this is for non-medical non-emergency medical transportation services in the selected service region. This is amendment one to the existing contract and it increases it by 6.3 million dollars number 14 dhs with division of provider services and quality assurance with public partnerships llc this is for counseling and financial management services
for self-directed independent choices programs number 15 dhs with handle information technologies this is with the division of youth services this is for the deployment of the right track system where dys and its service providers around the state connect remotely to the right track system and this is for the entry of information as well as providing for placement and billing data number 16 department of public safety
division of emergency management with motorola solutions this is amendment one to an existing contract and it is for site equipment and installation services for the arkansas wireless network sites as i mentioned previously contract number 17 with the department of military was pulled so we'll move to number 18 department of transformation and shared services building authority with ybanez enterprises incorporated this is amendment six to an existing contract for janitorial services for the garris for the hendricks building at 616 garrison in fort smith
Arkansas. Number 19, Department of Veterans Affairs with Health Dimensions Consulting Incorporated. This is for health auditing services at the North Little Rock and Fayetteville Veterans Homes for Medicaid reporting. Number 20, Department of Veterans Affairs Superior Linen Service. This is a new original contract for linen services at the Fayetteville Veterans Home. Number 21, Northwest Arkansas Community College with SHI International. This is an original contract for tracking of all non-credit learner data number 22 university of arkansas with deloitte consulting this is
amendment two to an existing contract this is to support institutional data conversion reporting analytics integration development and post implementation support of the workday student system platform number 23 u of a with fort hill associates this is for an audit of all the construction services that are provided on the uva campus number 24 uca with leapfrog technologies This is an original contract for course leaf, which is catalog information, curriculum, and syllabi management platform services.
Number 25 with UCA is with payer matrix. This is amendment one to an existing contract, and this is for addresses prescription drug costs for specialty drugs by dealing with alternative funding programs, accessing grant programs, and other related services. These are the
Chair
Unverified
1:08:02
out-of-state contracts. Thank you. Senator Bryant you're recognized thank you much here I
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:08:10
got a few that I'd like to call up I'm starting with Department of Commerce AEDC for item number two
Tim some from the agency come down please get back in Terry good afternoon my name is Edward Bailey I'm with the Arkansas Department of Broadband Department of Commerce state broadband office
Speaker 183
1:08:44
I'm the deputy director I go by lane my middle name thank you for being here I'm right
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:08:52
over here just curious on this contract can you give us kind of an idea of where we are with the grant program and, and the areas covered. And then the last statement says total projected cost remains the same
as original bid. We're talking about this contract. We're talking about all contracts related
to implementation of broadband. Oh, this, uh, that refers to this contract only. This contract is with Michael Baker international. It's actually a partnership. Also, uh, the other partner is a company called ready.net.
Michael Baker International is the engineering firm that we send out to inspect the construction of these broadband networks that we're funding. So Michael Baker does the inspections of the construction work, and they also do the hands-on review of the receipts and all the finances before we make any reimbursements. Ready.net provides our software, our mapping software, and our grants management software.
It's all in one package. So this is a contract, a partnership that covers all of that work. And, yes, we're still within the original amount that was awarded two years ago, and this is a two-year extension of that. As far as the overall program goes, we are on target. We were one of the first states for the BEAD program, the billion-dollar program, to have final approval from the NTIA, the U.S. Department of Commerce. And where we are right now, that final approval was received on December 4th.
And we'll have six months now to get that through here, through ALC, which the earliest we could bring it to ALC would be February. we're looking at either the february or the march when we will present all of those broadband projects to alc for appropriations approval uh once we get if we get that approval then we will look to get all of the sub-grant agreements signed with the various i think it's about 20 different
isps to build the remaining broadband
Speaker 183
1:11:04
projects that's about 77 000 homes okay and so this contracts puts them in front of
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:11:10
the ISPs to make sure they're doing it appropriately yes he's for there okay yes that's my question thank you thank you thank you
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
1:11:27
senator rice you're recognized it's far this one - don't run
off too quick I'm sorry I got distracted on the front part of your testimony does this your
contract today cover the final round of funding that's coming from the feds yes so so that's got to be completed within the next two years oh no these the contract we're in the uh
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:11:49
we're wrapping up the second year of a contract that
Speaker 183
1:11:52
can be extended up to seven years right but you will this contract will take
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
1:11:58
it out to the end of the fed this next large round of fed i think the next is probably the last large round to finish up
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:12:10
um the b program all of the uh projects have to be completed within four years of sub of signing of the sub-grant agreements and the those sub-grant agreements have to be signed within the next six months okay but if you're going
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
1:12:24
to be there this is for two years i'm sorry i didn't look at it yes sir it's for two years so we will need another two year extension need for supervision over to finish the program right yes okay okay that's what i was covering
there's going to be future need too and y'all y'all didn't get to come in on the first part that we wished you had been there when when there were some problems uh and and i i do appreciate y'all coming in and getting started on that I wish we'd
Speaker 196
1:12:55
had you back order when they did have problems I appreciate that thank you yes sir we will have to come back
Speaker 183
1:13:02
for another years thank you representative Richardson who's your question for DHS
okay we are done with you can we have somebody come down from
DHS what part of DHS item number 5 and
Speaker 199
1:13:20
15 both can someone come down from the agency please its
division of youth services is 15 and number 5 if I can get
to it is DHS and if you introduce yourself for the record please good
Speaker 204
1:13:51
afternoon Kim Gardner Office of Information Technology DHS Michael
Speaker 205
1:13:56
Krupp director of the Division of Youth Services
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:14:03
Mary Franklin director of the Division of County Operations for
Speaker 210
1:14:10
DHS thank you you're recognized Representative Richardson thank you madam chairwoman so thank you so much for being here I know we talked earlier about item 5 and you provide a lot of
information that was very helpful and so I really appreciate that the last question that I have remaining on this particular item it still revolves around so source and I know we kind of hit on that a little bit I did get the letter from the procurement, the approval letter, and I appreciate that. But I still come back to the same element. The letter itself stipulated that because this was created by them
that it made sense for them to continue to maintain it, essentially. And although I don't necessarily disagree with that mentality, My concern is around the state having systems that can't be maintained by other vendors. And so I guess if you could help me understand why we feel like that this is the only vendor that could provide those services, it would help me feel a lot more comfortable about this particular contract. Thank you for your question.
Speaker 204
1:15:26
We did a lot of research as we were preparing to determine which procurement strategy we should go, and we actually looked at some of our neighboring states as well as some other states that were also using this platform with Deloitte, and we had seen examples where they had tried to move to a different M&O vendor to support their platform, and they were not successful, and so we did not want to create a situation for us here in Arkansas. all we wanted to mitigate that risk especially looking at some of the upcoming changes that we
had in front of us and so that was one of the drivers for making that
Speaker 213
1:16:05
decision to stick with Deloitte. So the idea was because other
Speaker 210
1:16:11
states were not successful with other vendors you felt like that we wouldn't
Speaker 204
1:16:16
be successful? Primarily using the next gen platform that we are using with Deloitte, we looked at two other states, specifically Texas and Connecticut, who had that same platform and tried to move to a different vendor to support it. They were not successful in
those efforts. And so, yes, we thought it best to consider maintaining a relationship with
Speaker 214
1:16:37
Deloitte for M&O. Just for clarification purposes, the software that we're using wasn't special built for the state. It is a provided software as a service through that particular vendor. Is that
Speaker 204
1:16:49
correct that's my understanding and we've customized it quite a bit we've enhanced it since we implemented in 2022
Speaker 214
1:16:58
so migration to another vendor would mean a requirement of a
new software correct and the customizations to go along with that correct okay all right thank you for that one um madam chair do you want me to go on to my other question on the other item or i don't know is there any other questions on
this one uh get back in i think senator bryant has a question thank
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:17:26
you senator bryant thank you thank you i guess same question i was elected to the house in 2021 in a bill that i ran when mr white ran dhs was dealing with this
system and its development and how excited they were i think the argument i had was we're going to pay for it and it's going to get developed and then we're going to own it and maintain it so why jump into a contract with i think it was equifax that was saying hey i can do what areas is going to do but we can do it differently and we can implement and cross sector with different federal agencies and it would be a better product and i remember this agency pushed back on that saying give areas a chance but now i'm seeing here four years later that we are going to do hundreds of
of millions of dollars in perpetual care and maintenance for this system so is it is it possible that the agency can look and say yes we've we've downloaded a bunch of money in the system but it's going to cost us X amount of means of dollars a year regardless of the system we choose and maybe there is a competitor a third third-party vendor that can do this because I think agencies as a whole have a problem spending millions of dollars on software and then trashing them and so not saying that what we're gonna ask is new but is it possible we
look at to see what we can spend as a third party versus a system that we
have just some pride in senator Bryant thank you for the question I
Speaker 223
1:18:55
I'm gonna try to answer it I can tell you one thing I have learned throughout the process of design development and implementation for the ARRI system the Arkansas integrated eligibility system that this system integrates the rules for all the
programs we administer in county operations Medicaid eligibility rules SNAP eligibility rules the the transitional employment assistance rules as well as summer EBT now that it's a new program that we've added and the systems are very complex. We, you know, the contract, the actual work on the contract started in 2019, and I would say we had it fully implemented during 2022. May of 2022. May of 2022, and we did
not, you know, the system is not an end of life. It's still fairly young, and these systems, you know, the recommendation is to look at what do you do, you know, 12 to 15 years down the road. We did not want to replace anything. We feel like we needed longer to get our return on investment because it is costly to build a system like this that's integrated. We retired four other separate systems that our team was using in order to get to the place where we have ARIES
and we don't have staff entering information in more than one place for the same client. And we did also not want to take the risk of an increased cost should we go out for competitive procurement or the possibility of a new vendor coming in and that not being successful. Given things that we knew were going to be on our plates or that are on our plates now, and I can tell you, you never really finish building an IT system.
There is always a rule that needs to be changed or a process that you've determined there's a better way to do it. We can make this change in the system and become more efficient and do work more quickly or more accurately. So it is, you know, we went this route and it even included federal approvals to do it this way, including the state plus federal approvals, basically to get us the best bang for our buck,
the best stability moving into the future while we continue to use this system and make sure we get our return on investment before we consider making any changes or rebuilding a system. I hope that helps. I guess it
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:21:36
does, but what's the cost we've spent so far? 2019 was kind of the initial contract
Speaker 204
1:21:45
i believe um where we are on our current contract with total projected cost is a little over 400 million but that includes ddi so that portion of ddi then
how far we are into maintenance and operations but we also had some other work that we did around the pandemic we added to the total projected cost of this contract to help support the business operations when they had some staffing shortages. So that, I believe, is around the estimated total projected cost to date. So
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:22:18
today is $400 million on ARX
Speaker 223
1:22:21
system. I think it's around $439 million for the existing contract that comes to end of life at the end of this month. And this new contract for M&O to continue maintenance and operations, is the number you
Speaker 211
1:22:34
have in front of you the $259 million?
Speaker 223
1:22:37
So it is significantly less than what we have spent the first seven years because of the big lift of design, development, and implementing this entirely integrated system with rules engine that has the policy built into it to help us
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:22:57
make sure we do consistent determinations. So how long will that $259 million take
Speaker 223
1:23:03
us before you're back needing more? Seven years. And $259 is the total for the seven-year total projected cost.
That's the three years. And the first three years is the $110. Correct. That's the
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:23:18
specific request today. Okay. So $250 million, $259 million for seven years of a $439 million system. So I guess it goes back, would the agency entertain any other vendors to come and say, I can do that
for 10 million for 20 years and it's the same product or is it we're committed into this system for seven years that's sounds like that's
what the agency wants to do okay thank you I have a question when you were talking about
that you built this system to combine four into one because they were entered in four different places how much money did that save us to have one provider versus
Speaker 223
1:24:05
those four did that save us any money well i don't i don't have those
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:24:09
numbers today i i can tell you we retired the system we called answer um we we it got us off mainframe
um it also retired uh another system that did medicaid only it was called curam um so maybe it was if you can just get us
those numbers by friday just send it to staff so they can send it out
Representative R. Scott Richardson
Unverified
1:24:33
okay uh representative richardson you're recognized thank you
Speaker 210
1:24:38
madam chairman again uh so just just to be clear i know i asked this question already but i want to go back to it just just to be clear the system itself the software underlying
Speaker 214
1:24:49
that we configured that we made our own that software is only provided by
Speaker 234
1:24:57
this vendor so the next gen was developed
Speaker 236
1:25:00
by deloitte what they have built here belongs to us and it's been they they use next gen as the base platform and then built it out to our specifications and continue to make changes to it as we determine necessary
Speaker 217
1:25:16
or we need to implement new rules So we own the source
Speaker 214
1:25:21
code for the underlying software, the primary underlying core software.
I know I'm trying to get into
Speaker 210
1:25:28
this just to make sure that I understand, again, I'm coming back to the same question that I've had before. We go to a sole source as if there are no other companies out there. And if this is their software, we're committed to their software. We have no choice but to leverage them to continue to maintain this and provide us updates. It is what it is. I would have objected in 2016 when this was first considered. But if we're locked into this vendor because this is only their software and we cannot, other than go to a different software, we have no other recourse, then that's a separate statement.
So I guess I'm just trying to understand, are we locked into this vendor? or are there any other opportunities at all for another company to come in and provide the same services on the existing software that Arkansas, I guess, owns at this
Speaker 236
1:26:23
point? So a competitive procurement was an option that we considered. So I think to answer your question, we could have done a competitive procurement to see if another vendor bid and qualified to maintain the system.
But in our research and in our weighing of the pros and cons and ultimate costs, we felt like the best direction was to request approval for the special procurement at the state level and at the federal level and were ultimately approved both at the state level and by the federal partners, CMS and FNS, to move forward with this special procurement contract. So just to, I'm
Speaker 210
1:27:07
going to restate what I think I heard you say,
that there are other vendors that could provide us the exact same services, but because of the nature of the relationship and existing knowledge, we chose to not go and do a competitive bid just to stay with the same one. Yes, sir. That's our understanding. Okay. Would you like for me to move on to 15? No. If you'll
hold on just a second, Senator Bryant has one more question, then you can get back in. Senator Bryant, you're recognizing me.
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:27:41
I've got one quick question. Who is the end user of ARIES? What state employee keys in the data that would give us a thumbs up or a thumbs down that it was worth the $439 million we spent? Because two, four, three years ago, plenty of state employees were not thrilled. And I'm curious, now that time has
passed, what those answers would be. So the main end users of the system would be our clerical staff for scanning and registering applications and incoming work.
And then our caseworkers and supervisors out in the field that determine eligibility. Okay, so you're field workers and
then down the road you're on Capitol Boulevard here. Yeah, we have
an office on Martin Luther King here in Pulaski, and we have an office in Jacksonville, and we also have an office on Baseline and offices in every county of the state. Okay, but
your staff office that does it directly for the agency, not the front line, is it here on the complex or is it?
Speaker 238
1:28:47
So we have staff all over that all use
Speaker 210
1:28:59
the system. okay all right thank you you're recognized thank you madam chairman uh so on 15 jumping to that one just a couple of quick questions one this uh amendment is to revise the scope of work um in this particular contract what got
Speaker 204
1:29:20
revised so it's my understanding with this contract we are just um bringing together a single payment
mechanism for this vendor so um it is i'm not i do not think that we change the scope of work of what handle is doing for dys just simply pulling together um two separate contracts to put it
Speaker 210
1:29:46
on one one contract. So it's the same exact scope, just pulling together other contracts. Correct. So what is the original, the original scope? I read the, the right track, uh, implementation,
building out the network and the connectivity. What is the, the scope is.
Speaker 208
1:30:04
So the scope, um, if I may, it, of this contract,
Speaker 205
1:30:09
it's our case management system for youth services statewide that both my staff, our residential providers, our community-based providers around the state utilize to keep track of all the juveniles' records, their education, their therapy, billing, all of those things. Nothing in the scope has changed. The separate piece was that piece that allowed us to, if we needed to, create something new in the system.
For example, we had something a couple of years ago to track some information we collected for the federal government. To be able to do that, we needed to put this all in one contract because I have the IT person sitting here next to me and I'd be able to explain it a little better than me. But when we want someone to change this system and build something new, Handle is the only entity. It's their proprietary system. So that we needed to be able to do that rather than have two separate ones.
The decision was made to put that all into one. And, you know, just to have that opportunity if the funding is there and if there's a need in the future to be able
Speaker 251
1:31:11
to build something new in the system. Well, building something new in the system obviously would be
Speaker 205
1:31:18
a change of scope, right? A new report or something of that nature, not necessarily changing the scope. So to give an example, my team that tracks therapy and all these things for the youth that are in our custody, we have a treatment plan that is followed.
Every juvenile that comes into our custody, they have a treatment plan after they're assessed that dictates what type of treatment they're going to get while they're in custody. We, at one time, had intended to build a treatment plan into this system rather than have something separate on paper or on spreadsheets or something of that nature so it would still be within the same scope of what they're doing with tracking juvenile justice and case management. It would just be paying for that work to be done to develop something new within the same scope.
Speaker 210
1:32:02
Okay, that makes sense. What is this amendment? I don't see how long the Length of this amendment is for just another year. Yes, is that correct? Yes, correct. So we paid eighty four thousand so far and now we're gonna pay another two hundred seventy four for one year How much of this System is implemented at this point that the system is implemented. We've been using it for I've been in
Speaker 205
1:32:33
D.Y.S. for seven years that we've been using it since well before I came here the right track system that handle developed So I believe the 84,000 piece is is the authority to be able to make any of those changes if we need to I know the ongoing cost for this contract is the 200 and some odd thousand per year That's the that's the amount we've been paying every year for several years and it includes a staff member from handle that's on site that helps us maintain if there's any kind of problems with the system, maintain and make sure that it operates properly.
Speaker 210
1:33:06
So we have a, just to make sure I understand, we have a software that is proprietary in nature that we had built for us that we are stuck with, if you will, with no ability to migrate to another vendor to help us with maintenance and operations because we've created a proprietary environment and a proprietary connection? I believe that we've
Speaker 205
1:33:33
tried in the past. We did, I believe, six years ago.
We attempted to procure a new contract. We put the procurement out there with all of our things that we needed for a new system. When that procurement went through, the bids that came back were considerably more expensive than this one. So the decision was made to let's just stick with what we have, get it up to date because some of the system things were changing, some of the Microsoft changes with Silverlight at the time. So the decision was made to stick with this because it was considerably less expensive than the other companies that bid. Handle did not, for that particular project, was not even, they weren't bidding on that one. So rather than
increase the amount that we were going to be spending per year considerably, the decision we made was to stick with the Handle right track system that we already had in place.
Speaker 210
1:34:23
So if I understand what you're saying, since we're locked into this system, we're locked into it for at least the foreseeable future with no options to do anything else. Well, I
Speaker 258
1:34:35
believe if we thought there was other systems out
Speaker 205
1:34:38
there that could do this exact same work as well or better than what the system does,
we would be able to put that out for procurement at any time if we decided to do that to try to get another system. I'm not aware of anybody that can do it for that same price or less. But in the future, I don't believe that we're locked in and don't have the ability to re-procure. We
Speaker 214
1:35:01
could do that if we chose to. Last question. I appreciate the latitude very much, Madam Chairwoman. Last question for you
Speaker 210
1:35:07
guys, and I appreciate you being here again answering all these questions. Do we own the underlying source code for this particular element?
Speaker 204
1:35:17
I'll need to take that back, Representative, and double-check how we wrote that contract when we initially began the relationship with Handel. I would like to think that we do, but I don't want
Thank you very much. For sure. I have a question. One thing that you said in your conversation was that you were
combining some contracts so there would be one pay source.
Speaker 204
1:35:42
So what contracts did you combine? We had one sole source that we have in front of us that only included development, the
development work, and then we had a separate that was exempt by law that covered our maintenance and operations for Handel, and so this will combine the two. Okay, and where are we at on
that one that you're combining? Is that contract done? Where is it at? It's this one. Okay. So
this will turn out to be the only one that you have for
them. That's correct. Thank you for the clarification. You're welcome. Representative, I mean, Senator Bryant, you're recognized.
Representative Rye, is the question for them? Yes, ma'am.
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
1:36:28
Okay. Representative Rye, you're recognized. Thank you, Madam Chairman. May I show this? This may be a hard answer to come up with real quick, but even if you did have another company that was as good or better, or even if you did, what would be the startup cost just to transfer all the information from your system now to that system that you would be in? Do you have any idea?
Speaker 208
1:36:54
I don't know exactly what it would be. I think that was one of the things when we
Speaker 205
1:36:59
attempted to do this before, the initial startup cost was going to be extremely expensive, and then we also looked at the ongoing yearly cost was also more than what we were paying currently under this maintenance and operation. So it was a matter of both those things were going to cost us considerably more. And if we were to do something, if we did find something that we thought might work, because our community-based providers, our residential providers, group homes around the state, there's a lot of different entities that utilize this system to track what's going on with the juvenile who's in DYS custody.
It would be something that we would be very deliberate about because we don't want to lose all the historical information that we have in the system. It's very important to hold on to that. So it's something that we would have to do a lot of research. We do think about those things and look around from time to time. If we do find something at that time, we would be very deliberate about doing this. It's not something we would do quickly. Thank you, Sergeant.
Speaker 254
1:37:48
Thank you, Madam Chairman. I think we're done with y'all. I appreciate it so
Speaker 269
1:37:54
much. Thank you. Thank you. Senator Bryant, who do you need?
Item 22, University of Arkansas. Okay, we have someone down from U of A. And if we'll come down and
Speaker 271
1:38:23
introduce yourself for the record, please. Melissa Russ,
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:38:27
University of Arkansas System. Thank you for coming down. Just looking at item 22, funding to support institutional data conversion.
reporting analytics that started in 2021 is there a is there an
end date to this contract or are we getting close to ending it or are we going to
Speaker 274
1:38:45
perpetually increase it no sir we're close to ending that several years ago um the uh university of arkansas system decided to implement an enterprise resource planning system or an erp system so that we could get all of our campuses is on the same human resource system, same finance system, and same student information system.
And so at that time, we selected, after a lot of research, we selected a company called Workday for the platform for HR finance and student information system. We selected Deloitte as the implementer, the consultant to help us implement, excuse me, the platform. And so this particular contract was for the implementation of the third piece of the ERP system, which is anything and everything that has anything to do with our students.
For instance, financial aid, student accounts, academic advising, everything, scheduling and all. That was this third piece, was the student information system, and so Deloitte has been the consultant that we retained for that purpose. amendment is amendment to which takes us to April 1st basically March 31st of next year and so it's a two point three million dollar amendment to an existing contract that we should be fully implemented on the student information
piece at the end of March we were fully implemented on HR and fully implemented with respect to finance this is the last piece okay
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:40:22
and then so to your knowledge do you expect the University to come back and ask for a operations and maintenance contract for Deloitte to allow the system to continue to operate the
system that we bought Senator Bryan I'm not
Speaker 274
1:40:37
aware I'm not aware of such simply simply I'm not aware so do you suppose
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:40:43
we own you know you of a will
own the system that was created and perform their own updates
and maintenance to it. I don't want
Speaker 274
1:40:55
to mislead you in response, you know, to your question. Um, I don't know that I can tell you that I know that definitively. I just simply, I know what I've shared with you, you know, which is, um, you know, that we, we will be fully implemented within a few months on the system. Now, obviously there may be updates, you know, I would imagine, you know, to the software system you know and all but this particular contract is specific
to the implementation of the system there was prior contract obviously for selection of the software vendor which is different obviously than than Deloitte okay and do you know we don't do we own the code I
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
1:41:32
do not know that sir I do not
all right thank you yes sir thank you thank you for coming members any other questions seeing none do i have
a motion for review a motion second all in favor say aye poll say nay thank you we're going to move down to d5 which is in-state contracts
Speaker 9
1:41:56
thank you madam chair in-state contracts begin on page 18 of your
Speaker 162
1:42:06
d packet there are 18 for your review today the first two are with arkansas state university The first contract is with Business Communications Incorporated. This is an original contract for $25,000. This is for WebEx migration, which is migrating over to web-based phone services for Arkansas State University.
Number two, also with ASU with Calmer Solutions. This is a new original contract for IT, advisory, and M365 management services, also for the university. Number three, Department of Corrections, Division of Community Corrections with Safe Haven Ministries. This is to provide comprehensive community-based treatment in a 23-bed female re-entry facility in Clarksville, Arkansas. Number four, Department of Energy and Environment, Division of Environmental Quality with Julian Bester. This is for janitorial services, continuing an existing contract.
Then we have contracts number five through number 10. These are all with Department of Human Services, Division of Aging Adults and Behavioral Health Services. This is for various providers throughout the state for therapeutic counseling services, and you'll see each provider covers a very
Speaker 9
1:43:18
specific set of counties. That takes us all the way over to item D, page 21. Contract number 11 is
Speaker 162
1:43:27
also with DHS, Division of Aging, Adults, and Behavioral Health Services.
This is with Western Arkansas Counseling and Guidance. This is also for therapeutic counseling, but it is for persons without insurance or any other payer source for medically necessary services. Number 12, with DHS, Division of Developmental Disabilities, with Ethan Leonard. This is for dental services at the Jonesboro Human Development Center, Amendment 3 to an existing contract. Number 13, DHS, Division of Medical Services with Arkansas Foundation for Medical Care. This is the final original special procurement that you'll see for this month.
So this is the last set of letters in your green packet. This is a $7.6 million contract for prior authorization and medical review services. Number 14, DHS Division of Youth Services with Edward Sherrill. This is for dental treatment services for youth residing in the care of DYS. Number 15, Department of Human Services with DYS with K.A. Lancaster Incorporated. This is for pharmacy consultation services for DYS. Number 16, Department of Transformation Insurance Services Building Authority with BRW Incorporated.
This is for janitorial services at their building at 900 West Capitol. Number 17 and 18 are both with the University of Central Arkansas. Number 17 is with Blue Advantage Administrators of Arkansas. This is for a third-party administrator services for UCA's self-funded health insurance. And then similarly, number 18 with UCA is with U.S. ABLE. This is for Dental Claims Administration for their self-funded dental benefit plans. These are the in-state contracts, Madam Chair. Thank you. Members, any questions?
Seeing none, I have a motion for review. Motion, second. All in favor say aye. Opposed, say nay. All
right. We're going to move on down to item number E1, which is service
Speaker 9
1:45:25
contracts and amendments without change. Thank you, Madam Chair. The last three items or the last few items for
Speaker 162
1:45:31
your review are the reports and communications. There are three regular monthly reports for your information. They are the contracts that were approved without a material change.
They're also the minor executed contracts, that's E2. And number three is critical emergency procurements that occurred during the month. And those are the
reports, Madam Chair. Any questions? Seeing none, motion, second, all in favor say aye. Aye. All right. nays thank you it's passed um seeing no other business we're adjourned
Agenda
A. Call to Order - Comments from Chairs - Items Held from Previous Meeting
B. Methods of Finance
C. Discretionary Grants
D. Services Contracts for Legislative Review/RFQ Approvals
E. Reports and Communications
F. Other Business
G. Adjournment
Documents
| Title | Type | Pages | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agenda — ALC - REVIEW, Dec 16, 2025 | Agenda | 2 | Official source ↗ |
| A.1 - Contract Held from November DHS-DCFS Evident Change | Exhibit | 1 | Official source ↗ |
| B. 1-7 Methods of Finance - December 2025 | Exhibit | 3 | Official source ↗ |
| C. Grants | Exhibit | 11 | Official source ↗ |
| D. Contracts | Exhibit | 24 | Official source ↗ |
| E.1. Reports - PCS_TGS Previously Review No Material Change Report | Exhibit | 9 | Official source ↗ |
| E.2. Reports - PCS TGS 25000-350000 Minor Report | Exhibit | 4 | Official source ↗ |
| Supplemental Agenda | Exhibit | 9 | Official source ↗ |
Speakers
Representative Frances Cavenaugh Chair
Unverified
Speaker 6
Speaker 8
Speaker 9
Chair
Unverified
Representative DeAnn Vaught
Unverified
Speaker 23
Speaker 25
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
Speaker 39
Speaker 40
Speaker 41
Speaker 45
Speaker 37
Speaker 50
Speaker 26
Speaker 53
Senator Joshua Bryant
Unverified
Speaker 90
Speaker 94
Speaker 96
Speaker 107
Speaker 116
Speaker 120
Speaker 51
Speaker 127
Senator Bart Hester
Unverified
Speaker 131
Speaker 149
Speaker 162
Speaker 168
Speaker 170
Speaker 172
Speaker 173
Speaker 183
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
Speaker 196
Speaker 199
Speaker 204
Speaker 205
Speaker 210
Speaker 213
Speaker 214
Speaker 223
Speaker 211
Representative R. Scott Richardson
Unverified
Speaker 234
Speaker 236
Speaker 217
Speaker 238
Speaker 208
Speaker 251
Speaker 258
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
Speaker 254
Speaker 269
Speaker 271
Speaker 274