A government task force examining recent failures in
technology projects reported Tuesday that a lack of oversight was the largest contributing
factor to gaffes wasting taxpayer dollars.

The Speaker?s Task Force on State Information Technology
Failures delivered a letter to Assembly Speaker Mike Huebsch, R-West Salem,
outlining its recommendation, the product of research and public input since
the task force was commissioned last summer.

?[The task force] was charged with an important assignment:
examining what went wrong with recently-failed state IT projects, and
determining solutions which would protect taxpayer dollars in the future,? said
the task force?s chair, Rep. Phil Montgomery, R-Ashwaubenon, in a statement.

To improve oversight of IT projects, the task force
recommended reinstating the defunct Joint Committee on Information Policy and
Technology. According to Rep. Louis Molepske, D-Stevens Point, the committee
was reinstated in the Senate, and the commission called on Huebsch to do the
same in the Assembly.

?Individuals charged with managing computer software
projects and the like did not do a very good job transferring their IT project
responsibilities and procedures,? Molepske said. ?There was no stopgap
procedure to keep the data flowing.?

Molepske said the task force spent time looking into
projects, including a failed computer payroll system at the University of
Wisconsin System that cost $24 million.

?We spent several millions of dollars, and after it was
spent, we got nothing,? Molepske said. ?There is nothing the taxpayer could
look at or hold to see what that money was spent on.?

The letter to the speaker also mentioned some issues had
been addressed in the budget, citing provisions ?aimed at curbing the culture
of mismanagement which facilitated the waste of tax dollars on IT projects.?

Molepske said in addition to lack of oversight, the
projects had been plagued with overspending.

?It is my hope that the failures in the past would not be
repeated and that there would be executive sponsors of all those projects and
the projects will be closely monitored, ? and there will be protocol put in
place if the bills coming due are greater than were expected,?

Molepske said.

However, Molepske said past problems had gone as far back
as the time of Tommy Thompson?s governorship.

?You can?t really point the finger at one governor or Department
of Administration head,? he said.