OLYMPIA – Washington paid a bankrupt technology company $2.6 million to settle a dispute arising from the ongoing problems of installing a new computer system at community colleges in Spokane and Tacoma.
Originally estimated to cost $100 million, the system is several years behind schedule and at least $10 million over budget. It has been the source of ongoing problems for administrators, staff and students at the Spokane and Tacoma campuses, which served as a test sites for software and equipment the state plans to install in all its community colleges. Expansion of the system, called ctcLink, has been halted until problems in Spokane and Tacoma are worked out.
Behind schedule
Ciber, Inc., a Colorado-based information technology company, signed the contract in 2013 to install ctcLink and train community college staff. Initially scheduled to be operating on all 34 of the state’s community and technical colleges by June 2017, that schedule was set back several times and is now uncertain. The project fell further behind schedule after hitting major snags when installed in Spokane and Tacoma. Students were unable to register for classes, or were bounced out of classes in which they’d been accepted, or did not receive financial aid. Some employees didn’t receive paychecks.
The State Board of Community and Technical Colleges last year withheld some payments, arguing work in the contract was either not done or not up to standard. Ciber filed for bankruptcy in April, and a few days later sued the state, saying the board hadn’t paid for some $13 million in work the company had done.
In June, the state denied Ciber’s claims of breach of contract and allegations that the board was responsible for all delays. It argued the state didn’t owe Ciber anything; rather, it was the company that had failed to complete most of the tasks in its contract. Ciber should be paying the state, not the other way around, Deputy Attorney General David Stolier said in a counterclaim.
A month later, the state and Ciber reached a settlement. The state paid the company $2.6 million, not the $13 million it requested. The community colleges will keep the software and equipment that has been installed so far, and have the right to hire some former Ciber employees who were involved in setting up the system.
Neither side admits liability as part of the settlement, and each releases the other from any claims.
Uncertain costs
The cost of the project — which comes out of the community college system’s Innovation Fund, not the state’s General Fund — is not expected to grow because of the $2.6 million settlement, Laura McDowell, director of communications for the State Board of Community and Technical Colleges.
“The settlement was about work that was already factored into our budget,” McDowell said. “However, our costs will likely go up because of the time and resources involved in the important remediation work underway with our pilot colleges.”
Those costs, too, would come from the Innovation Fund, which gets its money from a 3 percent share of tuition operating fees that all state community college students pay.
But ctcLink is not ready to be installed in the state’s other community colleges. Most problems with student registration and employee paychecks have been fixed, but Spokane colleges are still working on problems with accounting functions for the system’s main books, known as the general ledger.
