MN LARS UPDATE
This morning I participated in an Executive/Legislative branch briefing on MN LARS. Here is a summary with links from Dana Bailey, the Executive Director of Projects & Initiatives at Minnesota IT Services (MN.IT):
Dear Members,
Today we briefed members of the House and Senate Transportation Finance Committees and House Select Committee on Technology on the roadmap and associated budget for improvement and ongoing enhancement of the MNLARS system. As we committed to all of you in December, we are sharing this roadmap with all members of the Minnesota Legislature and have attached it here for your review. Also attached is a factsheet outlining the additional funding that is needed to support execution of the roadmap.
This project roadmap shows the path forward to ensure that all high-priority defects and critical functionality gaps that have been identified by MNLARS stakeholders will be fixed by July 2018. After July of this year, we plan to transition our focus to building out additional functionality as prioritized by system users through December of 2019.
The work outlined in this roadmap was prioritized by deputy registrars, auto dealers, DPS, and other external stakeholders. As you are aware, we’ve been meeting with stakeholders statewide with the goal in mind of creating this roadmap based on their critical feedback. These meetings were productive and informative, and we are incredibly grateful for all the time stakeholders put into these discussions. In addition, the MNLARS Executive Steering Committee invested another 20 hours over multiple days in a prioritization process that was not easy but yielded very important results. At the same time, Joan Redwing and the IT team have been working on a deep technology assessment of the system and an inventory of all remaining system defects and gaps in functionality. Both of these processes concluded last week, which is why we are able to deliver the roadmap to you today, as we committed to in early December.
While this roadmap was developed, work to improve the system and process backlogged transactions continued on a daily basis. DPS has decreased the title backlog by roughly 37% since the high point in early December, and the total backlog continues to trend down every day. The IT team has delivered two high-quality releases since December - resolving defects in the system and implementing needed new functionality - and another large release is scheduled for mid-February.
The need for each fix and improvement indicated on the roadmap is clear, but current resources will only support a small volume of that work for the remainder of the biennium. Without additional funding, deputy registrars and other system users will continue to contend with cumbersome workarounds, system errors, and gaps in system functionality for the foreseeable future. If we do not get a commitment to provide additional funding, we will need to begin ramping down work on MNLARS in March of this year, and it will not be feasible to execute this roadmap in the timeline laid out in the attached materials.
We understand this is a lot of information to take in, and we will continue to schedule additional briefings as requests come in. I’m sure there will be many discussions that need to take place in the coming days and weeks; and while we are confident we are on the right path, we cannot keep making progress without the support of the legislature early in session. We look forward to working with you on next steps.
I have attached the MNLARS Roadmap, MNIT/DPS Press Release, Governor’s Press Release, Budget Fact Sheet as well as a link to all of these documents online.
Sincerely,
Dana Bailey
NEW BABY TAPIR AT THE MN ZOO
I had a behind the scenes tour on Friday, and I was fortunate enough to see the new Baby Tapir and Momma at the Minnesota Zoo. You can follow @mnzoo for more updates! Here’s a link to an adorable video of one of her first swimming lessons!
LEGACY GRANT FUNDING AVAILABLE
MN State Arts Board.
- Application for funding through the “Arts Learning” grant program is now open through Friday, February 16, 2018. Applications must be submitted and accepted before 4:30 p.m. on the day of the deadline. The program funds projects that help lifelong learners acquire knowledge, understanding, and skills in the arts with a teaching artist. More info.
- The FY 2019 “Minnesota Festival Support” grant program is now open for application through March 23, 2018. More info. This is a grant program designed to provide meaningful arts experiences to Minnesotans through festivals that celebrate the arts, build community, and expose communities to diverse art forms including
folk and traditional arts. Proposed projects must take place between September 1, 2018, and August 31, 2019.
MN Historical Society.
The pre-application deadline (required) for the next round of funding through the “Heritage Partnership” program closed Jan. 26, 2018 with a final application deadline of March 9, 2018. The program’s goal is to build the capacity of eligible applicants to preserve and enhance access to Minnesota’s history and cultural resources by supporting the creation and development of sustainable, history-based partnerships throughout the state. More info.
DATA ON POPULATION& ECONOMIC TRENDS IN THE MIDWEST
Here is some interesting summary data providing an end-of-year checkup for 2017 with state statistics on population, education and economic trends in the Midwest: http://www.csgmidwest.org/policyresearch/0118-MW-data.aspx