Panel reviews DoIT oversight bill that would expand project accountability; vote deferred

Legislative staff and committee members reviewed House Bill 738 on March 28, a measure amended to increase executive and legislative oversight of large information-technology projects across state agencies.

"This bill started as a bill seeking to get dashboard information and seeing that our IT modernization projects over the last several years have very much overspent," an author identified in the hearing explained, saying an Office of Legislative Audit report highlighted process failures. The reworked bill clarifies DoIT's role in oversight and implementation and adds statutory guardrails staff said are needed to assign responsibility for projects that have historically exceeded budgets and schedules.

Vicky Gruber, who has been drafting the amendments, told the subcommittee the updated language defines "oversight of implementation" as managing the process by which a unit implements a new technology system and gives DoIT authority to withhold funds where an agency lacks internal capacity. Agencies would need to identify management teams, acknowledge accountability for projects and report progress; the bill also requires CIOs to meet quarterly with the secretary to discuss scope, schedule, budget and vendor performance.

The amendments remove a provision giving the proposed Maryland Office of Digital Experience independent procurement authority; instead, the bill creates a work group to study whether independent procurement would be appropriate. Staff also described funding options to support oversight: the Information Technology Investment Fund (staff cited a balance figure of $121,000,000 during discussion) and $4.3 million currently budgeted for staff-augmentation contracts could be used optionally to support DoIT's project management activities. The committee discussed a $500 million, 10‑year master Agile contract and set a reporting threshold for projects above $1,000,000.

Representatives from Maryland Digital Services, the Department of General Services and DoIT expressed broad agreement with the direction of the amendments but asked for more precise timelines and milestones for rolling out the changes. "We are putting a lot of a lot of things in place to start addressing that, and I think this codifies a good amount of that," Marcy Jacobs of Maryland Digital Services said.

Melissa Ross from the governor's office asked DoIT to review the newest draft over the weekend and submit fine-tuning adjustments; the chair said the subcommittee did not intend to take a vote at this meeting and will circulate technical corrections and a reprint before reconvening.

The committee did not adopt final statutory changes at the session; staff will circulate updated language and agencies will supply recommended timelines and fiscal milestones to inform the subcommittee's next action.