In my quest to find out just how and why we as tax payers are spending millions of dollars – background on this story here and here – for a web site that has little more functionality than my own weblog I’ve sent the following open records request to the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board:
Wisconsin Government Accountability Board
44 East Mifflin Street Suite 601
Madison, WI 53703December 31, 2008
To Whom It May Concern:
In accordance to Wisconsin Statutes 19.31-19.39, please consider this a formal open records request for the following information regarding for the Request for Proposal (RFP) #EB-CF01 Campaign Finance Information System dated May 3, 2007 by the Government Accountability Board (then known as Wisconsin State Elections Board):
• The Cost Proposal and any related documents to the Cost Proposal, as required by RFP #EB-CF01, submitted by the winning vendor, PCC Technology Group,
• The Responses to Technical Proposal, Implementation, Warranty, Maintenance and Support as required by §7.4 of RFP #EB-CF01
• The Scored Proposal by the CFIS Steering Committee for the response to RFP #EB-CF01 from PCC Technology Group as specified in §6.1 of the RFP.
• Records since May 2007 that specify any and all deliverables relating to RFP #EB-CF01 to be made by PCC Technology Group to the GAB that would define a successful implementation and/or completion of the Campaign Finance Information System.
• The Implementation Plan submitted by PCC Technology Group in accordance with the RFP #EB-CF01
• A copy of all invoices submitted to the State Elections Board and/or the Government Accountability Board and/or the State of Wisconsin by PCC Technology Group related to their work on the Campaign Finance Information System including but not limited to maintenance, warranties, implementation, training, support and enhancements.
• A copy of the signed contract between PCC Technology Group and the Government Accountability Board for the Campaign Finance Information System as specified in RFP #EB-CF01 as having an end date of June 30, 2012.Thank you for your complete and prompt attention to this matter. I appreciate receiving the information as soon as practicable. Either an electronic or print out of the preceding information will be considered sufficient, sent either via mail or email. Please notify me if the cost of the materials will exceed forty dollars.
Sincerely,
Daniel Cody
I’ll be sure to post any responses or updates about this matter as they happen. As an agency that is founded upon transparency, I have every reason to believe the GAB will comply with my request in a timely and comprehensive manner.
I live in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Milwaukee, WI with my wife Jen, our daughter Emerson, and sons Carter and Colton.
Do you know if Wisconsin law allows vendors to mark items as confidential? I know recent changes to PA and NM law make any proposals fully public (whether accepted or not), but I know that is normally not the case. For us it causes some serious problems, because we include screenshots, etc. of systems we have built in other states, and our higher ups consider that confidential information we need to protect in order to maintain competitive advantage. Generally we strip out all screenshots and other competitive information if the state has laws that make all proposals discoverable to our competition.
Just a thought with regard to what you may or may not get back in response to this… very interesting to follow your efforts here in any case.
Matt, there is the ability to have “sealed RFPs”, which this one was, but only on the part of the State agency, not the vendor. I believe the intent there is to ensure that any entity who wants our money should feel OK about letting the public know they’re after it.
After talking to a few people who know more than I about the in’s and out’s of the Wisconsin laws that dictate bidding/contracts/etc, the only reason for a RFP to be sealed would be if it included proprietary information or data, or it included ‘sample data’ so the vendors would know what kind of information they’d be dealing with.
The latter seems reasonable in this case, but the same folks suggested that wouldn’t require the entire RFP to be sealed or private, only the amendments, responses to vendor questions about the RFP, or data samples sent in addition to the RFP.
Great info. Thanks for following up.
I don’t necessarily agree with our position on “confidential info” in our RFP responses (particularly because the screenshots are from other public sector clients, and that software belongs to that state’s citizens and could be shown to our competitors at their will), but I’m way too low on the totem pole for my opinion to matter in the slightest.
I do know that our position is a common one, though; while having a fully open records law like PA and NM do makes sense to me from a moral/ethical standpoint, at the same time I can’t ignore that the result is that these states get a lower quality response to their RFIs and RFPs than do other states. Again, I’m not qualified to comment on what kind of impact this has long-term on the states in question (maybe none, since states share technology with each other all the time).
It’ll be interesting to see what comes back.