Updated August 10, 2009

Please take a moment to review OIT's new IT Budget Planning Process. As outlined below, the process has changed somewhat from prior fiscal years, but the fundamental basis has not changed from what has been discussed since SB 08-155 was implemented. OIT expects to use its leadership role to support agency and statewide technology planning efforts for the benefit of the entire enterprise in a number of ways.

Budget Change Request Review Process -- FY 2010-11 Decision Items

Even prior to the implementation of SB 08-155, OIT began to take a more proactive role in the process of development and submission of information technology budget change requests. During the past budget cycle, agencies were requested to identify the nature and scope of all proposed IT change requests to OIT even prior to development of the actual requests. This allowed OIT & OSPB to better coordinate, support and prioritize agency requests to determine if consolidation/collaboration opportunities exist and to verify that the requests support the strategic direction for information technology as established by the State Chief Information Officer.

In the current budget cycle, OIT will continue to review proposed IT Decision Items with agencies in the concept stage prior to full development. Departments will subsequently be required to submit IT change requests directly to OIT for review and OIT will analyze and submit approved requests to OSPB. This will facilitate the most comprehensive and accurate requests and will prevent unnecessary agency workload in the form of the additional analytical and documentation requirements that come with a request labeled as "IT." As previously indicated, FY 2010-11 information technology Decision Items should be submitted to OIT by July 6, 2009 for review and approved requests will be submitted to OSPB at the beginning of August per the OSPB Budget Calendar.

OIT further intends to coordinate with agencies throughout the process to seek effective solutions that may be able to be accomplished within existing state resources absent a budget change request, or to otherwise work toward addressing issues going forward that are unlikely to be approved by OSPB and/or the legislature in the current cycle due to existing fiscal constraints.  In some cases, for example, OIT staff and management may work directly with agency staff to develop the framework and analyses necessary to justify and support budget change requests to be submitted in future budget cycles.

With regard to IT Change Requests, an IT Project Plan (ITPP) is required for all Information Technology Change Requests that include more than 500 hours of IT work or more than $25,000 of IT products or services. The ITPP form can be located on the OSPB and OIT websites and should be submitted to OIT with the associated change request. The ITPP must demonstrate an informed decision on the initiative through collaboration and planning with OIT. A cost analysis is required for all Change Requests for which it applies, including all information technology requests. The required format can be located on the OSPB and OIT websites and is part of Appendix N of the current OSPB Budget Instructions. Costs should be quantified for the full lifecycle of the project (in order to ensure that the Total Cost of Ownership [TCO] is fully considered) including planning, development, and ongoing operations and maintenance. The OIT Cost Analysis form is also to be submitted with the corresponding Change Request.

OSPB FY 2010-11 Budget Instructions -- Chapter 10 -- IT Requests

Please refer to the following attachment which outlines processes associated with statewide information technology budgeting as distributed by OSPB to departments in late June 2009.

OSPB Budget Instructions - Chapter 10 - Information Technology

IT Cost Benefit Analysis and IT Project Plan forms for FY 2010-11 Budget Cycle

Please refer to the attached IT Cost Benefit Analysis worksheet (along with IT Category definitions) and IT Project Plan template. As OSPB previously indicated in Chapter 10 of the OSPB Budget Instructions (Information Technology Requests), these forms will be required for all IT Decision Items. Very minor changes have been made to the IT Project Plan, and the IT Cost Benefit Analysis worksheet has been modified to make it more consistent with the forms that are part of the Department IT Planning (DITP) process, although those changes are generally seamless.

IT Project Plan
IT Category Definitions
IT Cost Benefit Analysis Form - (includes the IT Budget Analysis Schedule, the IT Asset Inventory Schedule, a summary of FY 06 and FY 08 IT Spend by object code for each agency and a detailed summary of FY 08 IT spend by Department, fund and appropriation.)

Department IT Plan (DITP)

In August of 2008, Executive Branch Departments were required to complete a streamlined version of a department information technology systems plan which contained information regarding base budget requests related to IT systems. This year OIT has modified the process in order to improve the utility associated with the data collection process. Beginning with the current budget cycle, Executive Branch Departments and OIT will collaboratively engage in an annual process to identify and justify the base information technology budget. Departments will identify all components of planned information technology expenditures from their base budget for the current fiscal year and the budget request year by system/project/application/function/activity in terms of both dollars and FTE. The process and the data that will result are consistent with the Department IT Plan (DITP) that has been required in past fiscal years, although the current process is streamlined considerably. Note that projects and systems should be discretely identified if they result in more than 2500 hours of effort or the acquisition of $100,000 or greater of IT products and services.

The following instructions and guidance for the annual Department Information Technology Plan submission were distributed to state Departments on June 17, 2009 with a requested completion date of August 3, 2009.

This email and the attachments are associated with the statewide IT planning process. OIT requests that all Executive Branch departments complete a Department Information Technology Plan based on the attached instructions and return them to OIT electronically by August 3, 2009.

Components of the Departmental Information Technology Plan include the following:

• IT Budget Analysis Schedule for FY 2009-10 & FY 2010-11-
  
  An Excel workbook is attached to allow you to capture data that summarizes your budgeted and planned IT activity for FY 2009-10 & FY 2010-11. This deliverable is similar in many ways to what agencies completed in past fiscal years as part of your historic DITP submissions but seeks to minimize the need for multiple schedules and onerous collection of data that will not be fully utilized.
  
  Instead, this form is organized to capture the entire scope of each department's IT budget in the context of existing systems, activities and operations, new projects, OIT services/Common Policy billings, discretionary IT spend and other miscellaneous items not captured above. OIT requests that this data be provided for both FY 2010 and FY 2011 -- for FY 2011 we are looking forward to the budget request year (and proposed Decision Items should be referenced). For FY 2010 current base appropriations and new approved projects from last budget cycle should be considered (including JBC approved change request and other new projects initiated beginning in FY 2010).
  
  Although the form is likely familiar to many of you who have worked with OIT on such deliverables in the past, we have added comment fields in each column on the header row and you can hover over these cells for direction and guidance on how to populate the various columns (excerpts of this guidance is also pasted below). Additionally the columns associated with personal services and operating costs include some guidance related to specific COFRS object codes that generally should align to the categories.
  
  
  
• IT Asset Inventory;
  
  The third tab of the attached workbook will allow you to summarize a current inventory of your department's capitalized IT assets. This is likely something that is ongoing and completed internal to your department but has not been collected formally by OIT recently. This schedule is intended to provide a high-level, comprehensive overview of the department's IT asset inventory and their associated costs (including those for replacement, recurring maintenance, as well as administration and support).
  
  
• Capstone Document - (click here for template)
  
  The Capstone Document is essentially an Executive Summary of your Department's Information Technology Plan. It includes a series of questions to supplement the other DITP components with more free flowing narrative responses that can serve to introduce and/or reconcile the sets of purely quantified data captured in the IT Budget Analysis Schedule. Although specific questions are included on the attached Microsoft Word template, topics include the following:
  
  • Major initiatives for the planning cycle (FY 2010 -- FY 2013);
  • Specific technology procurement and system acquisition plans for the planning cycle;
  • Hardware/software upgrade or decommission plans for the upcoming budget cycle;
  • Identification of risks, issues and concerns with the Department's information technology infrastructure; and
  • State, federal and local legislative and statutory mandates with IT implications

The goal of this Information Technology planning process is to ensure that OIT is able to provide the proper level of statewide oversight and support to departments, to ensure transparency and visibility, and to provide insight regarding potential collaboration and consolidation activities. Please complete the IT Budget Analysis Schedule (both FY 2009-10 & FY 2010-11), the IT Asset Inventory worksheet, and the Capstone document and return all via email by August 3, 2009 to Timothy Murphy (timothy.murphy@state.co.us) with a cc to Todd Olson at todd.olson@state.co.us. As always, try to be as comprehensive as possible and don't hesitate to provide additional feedback, data and information as you deem appropriate to adequately summarize your Department's technology environment, infrastructure and issues. If you have specific questions please contact us directly.

OIT FY 2010-11 IT Budget Analysis Schedules to CIOs - June 17, 2009
Capstone Document Template

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