Key Questions

Is the project on track to satisfy the customer's business objectives?Yes

Is the project on track to achieve the objectives in the approved timeframe?Uncertain

Is the project on track to achieve the objectives within the approved budget?Uncertain

Project Overall Health

Comments

Red

The Project Overall Health rating is assessed as Red in April 2026 due to the current assessment of focus areas. -- Time Management and Quality continued Red: Escalated for immediate corrective action. All remaining Milestones were due to be completed in the December 2025 – January 2026 timeframe, and many remain in progress. The backlog of defects, combined with build and testing delays, may impact Production Simulation. -- Cost Management, Transition Management continued Yellow: Caution, risks/issues exist. Federal funding requested in the APDU for FFY 2026 was approved on April 21, 2026. The additional cost of Production Simulation is not reflected in the SPR6 FAW. -- Governance, Scope, Resources, Risks/Issues, continued Green: Satisfactory, no corrective action necessary. The Board of Directors and Executive Leadership Team are actively engaged. • In lieu of the previously approved Pilot, the Board-approved Production Simulation approach for V1 readiness is planned in two phases, with Phase 1 scheduled to start on May 4 and Phase 2 on May 26, 2026. • Product delivery continues with 19 milestones complete, 17 in progress. The system scope includes core product development, infrastructure, interfaces, shared services, data conversion, scenario testing, rework based on user feedback, and design blueprints. • In April, 1 high-priority risk and 2 high-priority issues were closed. There are currently 8 high-priority issues. • In the project’s March 2026 Project Status Report (PSR) submission to the CDT, OTSI responses continued as “Uncertain” for the Key Questions: -- “Is the project on track to achieve the objectives in the approved timeframe?” -- “Is the project on track to achieve the objectives within the approved budget?”

Focus Area/Rating	Comments
Governance Green	The Governance rating continued Green in April 2026. The scope and character of decision-making authority are documented, and governance bodies meet regularly. • The last approval document, SPR 6, approved in May 2023. -- The project schedule was re-baselined on July 3, 2024. -- The Financial Analysis Worksheets (FAW) do not yet include the Production Simulation costs. • The ACF approved the FFY 2026 APDU in April. • Two As-Needed APDUs were approved in April for amendments to several contracts, with some expiring in 2026. • Planning continues for the Production Simulation, which was approved by the CWDS Board of Directors in December 2025. -- Phase 1 is scheduled to start on May 4 with synthetic data. -- Phase 2 is scheduled to start on May 26 with converted data. • War Room (leadership working sessions) activities that began in October 2025 continue on a weekly basis with active engagement from project leaders, managers, and contributors. • Five decisions were made via the Decision-Making Framework in April: -- 606 V1 Readiness Production Simulation Go/No-Go decision for 5/4. -- 605 County Forms Authors will use an assigned CWS-CARES taxonomy approach. -- 604 Production Simulation - Interface timelines. -- 603 Production Simulation - two environments. -- 602 Extend County Data Validation for Mock 1. • Constituent engagement includes regular communications to constituents, including Pilot Announcement, Progress & Engagement Summary, Explorer Newsletter, Staff Survey, and Data Dictionary update. • ACF Monthly Report on User Engagement & Adoption – March report with key accomplishments and stakeholder topics was prepared and submitted. -- Continued Extended User Scenario Testing (EUST) 3 to support statewide system validation and readiness. -- Hosted Stakeholder Briefing #6 to provide project updates and demonstrate system functionality. -- Advanced preparation for Production Simulation to support statewide readiness for Go-Live. -- A total of 14 communications were sent to stakeholders and users • Per an SPR 6 approval condition, the project utilizes Earned Value Metrics (EVM) to monitor project health. The Total V1 Scope is measured in Function Point Equivalents (FPE). The April FPE value of 88,148 is consistent with values since December 2025.
Time Management Red	The Time Management Focus Area rating continued Red in April 2026. • Although product milestone progress continues, delivery has not consistently aligned with baseline expectations, resulting in downstream impacts to Production Simulation activities. • 19 (+2) of 37 product and interface milestones have completed the Service Delivery Life Cycle (SDLC) stage. All product milestones and interfaces have been mapped to EUST testing/validation cycles. -- EUST 1 finished May 2024. All 3 milestones are SDLC complete (blue). -- EUST 2 finished April 2025. All 9 milestones are SDLC complete (blue). -- All 21 EUST 3 milestones were due to finish in the months of December and January. Currently, 3 are SDLC complete (Blue), 17 are overdue (Red). -- Federal and State Reporting milestones continue with development and testing activities in progress. Currently, 2 are SDLC complete (Blue), 1 is overdue (Red), and 1 is not determined. • IV&V 1.4.4.1 PaaS SI Poor Delivery Performance Increasing Schedule Risk and Declining Quality. • Sprint metrics are varied between the State PMO and PaaS SI. IPO recommends increasing the use of Jira canned dashboards and reports to show real-time data. Since Build Drop plan began, as of March end: -- State PMO monitors overall Sprint metrics for inclusion in the monthly PSR. Historical Overall Sprint Velocity (percentage of user stories completed versus committed) is 25.05 (BD1) = 24%, 25.06 (BD2) = 33%, 25.07 (BD3) = 40%, 25.08 (BD4) = 36%, 25.09 (BD5) = 22%, 25.10 = 12%, 26.01 =16%, 26.02 = 24%, 26.03 = 45%, 26.04 = 47%. -- PaaS SI Sprint Commitment and Closure reports focused on Build and SIT metrics. Historical Velocity for Application Functionality and Component stories (e.g., Salesforce, Interfaces, DocGen, DocuEdge, and Security) is 25.05 = 57%, 25.06 = 88%, 25.07 = 58%, 25.08 = 79%, 25.09 = 49%, 25.10 = 94%, 26.01 = 62%, 26.02 = 37%, 26.03 = 42%, 26.04 = 43%. • The monthly PSR is reporting “uncertain” that project objectives will be achieved within the approved timeframe. • The project maintains adequate control of the (Microsoft Project) V1 Schedule. State and Contractors’ staff collaborate and meet weekly with a standing agenda. Changes to Finish Dates require approval by the Project Director. • The project's performance in achieving the remediated and re-baselined project schedule is reported by PaaS SI to be on track. As of March end: -- PaaS SI schedule variance metrics show the overall project is on track at 97% (+2% from last month) complete, with 202 tasks Overdue and 5 Behind Schedule. -- IPO notes a positive variance (5%) comparing the percentage of V1 work completed (97%) and the elapsed state business days* (92%) planned to complete this work. Although the variance is less than 10%, the effort required to complete all remaining tasks may be greater or less than the effort required for the work completed to date. • As per the SPR approval conditions, the Project is using EVM to gauge performance. The Schedule Performance Index (SPI) decreased to 0.945 as of April 15, indicating the project is on schedule with a variance of less than 5% from the target of 1.0.
Cost & Contract Management Yellow	The Cost & Contract Management rating continued Yellow in April 2026. • The monthly PSR is reporting “uncertain” that project objectives will be achieved within the approved budget. • The approved FFY 2026 APDU is only for baseline costs. • As-Needed APDU 01 was approved to amend Financial Management Services, IV&V, and Security Testing Services contracts. • As-Needed APDU 02 was approved to amend PaaS SI, PVS, CDI, and Implementation services. • As-Needed APDU 03 was submitted on April 22, 2026 informing ACF of the new Implementation Services contract and no Federal Funding is requested. • On December 18, 2025, the Board of Directors approved a Production Simulation readiness approach for V1. The total estimated cost of $86.9 million includes $14.9 million for the Production Simulation and $72 million for implementation services. These costs are not delineated in the last approved FAW. -- Due to urgency, Federal funding was not requested for the $72 million in related contract amendments. State General Fund will be used. -- Funding has not yet been determined for the estimated $14.9 million needed for Production Simulation. • The Total Project Costs approved with SPR 6 are $1,711,011,443 with One-Time Costs of $1,228,909,579, Continuing Costs of $301,567,793, and Future Operations Costs of $180,534,071. • State funding requested in a Spring Finance Letter (SFY) 2025-26 BCP was approved in the budget signed by the Governor on June 27, 2025. -- Total One-Time Cumulative Expenditures are reported as $670,827,734, which is 24% less than the planned $883,997,918 Total Cumulative One-Time Budget planned for at this time. -- Current Year Cumulative Expenditures increased in February from $181,135,572 to $180,761,245 resulting from payment of contractors’ invoices. • As per an approval condition, the Project is using EVM to gauge performance. -- The 1.124 CPI reported as of April 15 is consistent with expenditures less than budgeted. The variance from the target 1.0 remains above 10% but is below the peak CPI of 1.378 in August 2025. • There are currently 13 services contracts for delivery of the CWS-CARES solution. -- 8 procurements are planned or in progress. -- 8 contract amendments are in progress.
Scope Management Green	The Scope Management rating remained Green in April 2026. • SPR 6 approval condition #1 is satisfied. The PMO continues to provide monthly extracts of the CARES Version 1 (V1) product scope. -- The April V1 Scope Extract prepared by the project illustrates that the V1 product functional scope is organized by four Extended User Scenario Testing (EUST) cycles and consists of 4,211 (+38 from last month) User Stories categorized into 37 product and interface Milestones (plus Rework, Forms, and Shared Services), 129 Building Blocks, and 507 Epics. IPO observes: -- 3,438 (82% of total) user stories have completed the SDLC phase. -- 1,256 (70% of EUST 3) out of 1,801 user stories for EUST 3 are Done. • There are eight external interfaces in scope. 4 are SDLC complete, and 4 are in progress. • There are 3 major IT systems used by one or more counties for which Data Conversion (DC) activities are in progress. -- 251 of 251 CWS/CMS tables fully mapped and transformed to CARES. -- 4,018 data elements complete -- Converted data loaded to CARES 151/151 Objects (1.15B+ Records). -- 87 million Documents Extracted with roughly 100,000 new/changed documents extracted weekly and continue in progress. -- Mock 1 Org validation period extended to April 22 due to county request • Development of 448 Statewide forms continues in progress. • Approximately 2,258 county-specific forms to be created by counties for CWS-CARES V1. A dedicated county development environment is available and utilized.
Resources Green	The Resources rating continued Green in April 2026. • Key consulting contracts that provide specialized, skilled contract staff supporting the project are available for implementation and readiness activities leading to Go-Live. • The approved FY 2025-2026 project budget allocates 126 positions, an increase of three positions above FY 2024-25. • The project’s overall position vacancies continued at 3% in March, with no hires made, and this is within the Project’s goal of 10%. • Total primary vendor resources increased to 734 (+36) staff, including: -- PaaS SI – 398 (-14) -- CDI – 166 (-1) -- PVS – 57 (+17) -- Implementation (Deloitte) – 2 (-67) -- Implementation (KPMG) – 101 (+101) -- QA/Testing – 10 (nc)
Quality Red	The Quality rating continued Red in April 2026. • Production Simulation activities may be impacted by development and testing delays. • The project is responding to 6 high-priority issues related to Quality. -- RI-378 (High Issue): RBAC Gaps for Sealed/Sensitive Records: High Defects; Converted Data Untested. -- RI-354 (High Issue): Non-Adherence to Best Practices in APEX Custom Code Management. The PaaS SI Team is not following an established, traceable process for requesting and procuring increases in Salesforce governor limits. -- RI-345 (High Issue): Insufficient QA capacity to support Build Drop volumes. The current QA velocity is not sufficient to complete testing of all stories and retest corrected defects to support EUST 3. -- RI-344 (High Issue): Separation of Business Rules. -- RI-342 (High Issue): Issues identified by Salesforce Code Quality Review. The analysis of the code by Salesforce has identified several quality issues that need resolution. -- RI-339 (High Issue): Automation Regression Test (ART) execution failures are poor and do not show an improvement or improving trend. The ART execution results have been showing a failing trend across majority of the Milestones that have passed manual validation within the QA environment. • IV&V observations continue without resolution, including: -- Observation 1.2.4.1 Gaps in SIT RCA Processes -- Observation 1.2.4.2 Significant SIT Failures Leading to High Defect Volume in QA -- Observation 1.4.4.1 PaaS SI Poor Delivery Performance Increasing Schedule Risk and Declining Quality -- Observation 1.4.5.1 Gaps in Test Execution and Defect Reporting Handoffs -- Observation 1.6.13 Ongoing Salesforce Apex Code Review -- Observation 1.7.5.1 Inadequate Storage Monitoring & Management in DevOps Environment • EUST 3 execution of scenario testing and functional validation finished on April 17, 2026. -- The Annual Progress Demonstration reported out of 2,690 total feedback items, 79 new requirements were identified, which have been elaborated into 51 Essential User Stories, 17 Required Iteration, and 11 Enhancements. • Medium priority issue opened (RI-370) to resolve high defect volumes in the QA environment. Stories with defects are returned for fixes multiple times and require retesting. -- As of April, there are a total of 1,501 open defects in the QA environment, including 972 PaaS SI, and 529 State QA; 731 are categorized as Critical and High. • The quantity of bugs/defects identified during System Integration Testing (SIT) and Quality Assurance (QA) phases increased. -- 12,713 (+722 more than last month) in SIT, and 11,712 (+1,469) in QA. -- 1,495 (610 less than last month) Open defects with 142 prioritized as Critical, 584 High, 640 Medium, and 129 Low. There are 103 defects categorized as ‘Fixed, in Joint Review’. -- 1,149 (77% of Total) Open Development Fixes. • Rework identified from user feedback indicates that some functionality may not fully meet user expectations, requirements, or usability standards. A V1 Scope extract that also provides updates on rework. -- As of April, 709 (93%) of the total 761 Rework user stories are Done. • ADA testing continues with 51 open defects; 39 Salesforce; 11 Image Trust; 1 PaaS SI.
Risk And Issues Green	The Risks and Issues rating continued Green in April 2026. Risk and issue management is mature, with all items recorded and updated in the Risks and Issues Jira Backlog. • The CWS-CARES team is managing 37 open project-level risks and issues, including 9 high-priority issues. -- RI-378 (High Issue): RBAC Gaps for Sealed/Sensitive Records: High Defects; Converted Data Untested. -- RI-354 (High Issue): Non-Adherence to Best Practices in APEX Custom Code Management. -- RI-345 (High Issue): Insufficient QA capacity to support Build Drop volumes. -- RI-344 (High Issue): Separation of Business Rules. -- RI-342 (High Issue): Issues identified by Salesforce Code Quality Review. -- RI-339 (High Issue): Automation Regression Test (ART) execution failures are poor and not showing an improvement. -- RI-327 (High Issue): Long processing time for Micro-conversion may impact Cutover and Pilot planning and implementation. -- RI-321 (High Issue): Insufficient time and resources to complete the development of County forms needed for CARES V1 Go-Live. -- RI-308: (High Issue) Delays in delivery of CARES V1 State forms. • Breakdown of active Risks and Issues: -- Issues: 23 (9 High, 10 Medium, 4 Low) -- Risks: 23 (0 High, 11 Medium, 3 Low)
Transition Readiness Yellow	The Transition Readiness rating continued Yellow in April 2026. • The Production Simulation Phase 1 was approved in April for a May 4 start. -- 17 Product Milestones are not yet Done. Additionally, a large volume of critical/high defects need resolution. -- The Production Simulation environment is designed to support ~25,000 statewide users. -- County users may experience quality issues until all V1 functionality has finished Development and Quality Assurance phases. • The project is responding to 3 high priority issues related to Transition Readiness. -- RI-327 (High Issue) Long processing time for Micro-conversion may impact Cutover and Pilot planning and implementation. -- RI-321 (High Issue) Insufficient time and resources to complete the development of County forms needed for CARES V1 Go-Live. -- RI-308 (High Issue): Delays in delivery of CARES V1 State forms. • On December 18, the Board of Directors approved the CARES V1 Path Forward, endorsing the Production Simulation environment and approach. -- ACF acknowledged the new path forward. -- Due to urgency, a competitive procurement was facilitated for a new V1 Implementation Services contract, and awarded to KPMG, LLP. The term is March 24, 2026, through June 30, 2027 (14 months). -- The contractor is in progress of developing a start-up plan anticipated for delivery in May. • Training activities will focus on two workstreams: -- Train-the-Trainer and Super Users Training -- End User Instructor-Led Training • Overdue Go-Live Readiness tasks continued to increase. -- County-Specific Forms: 35 of 2,288 forms are complete. -- County-Specific Reports: 9 of 2,115 of Business Objects to Tableau Reports are complete.
Conditions For Approval Green	The SPR 6 Approval Letter stipulates that the project must adhere to the following conditions (abridged language below): 1. Complete an elaboration of the Product Backlog to clarify program needs further and establish the inventory of functions and features required to complete the project. -- a) Satisfied – V1 product scope (Epics) must be elaborated into requirements (Stories) not later than October 31, 2024. IPO reviewed the materials in November 2024 and determined that it satisfies the condition. As per the CDT request, the project is also providing: 1) Tabular data that demonstrates completion progress and adjustments in total stories by milestone in future Project Status Report (PSR) and Quarterly Project Report (QPR) submissions to the CDT, commencing with the PSR due in December 2024. 2) The PSR and QPR reports include tabular data specifically on the details and progress of the "Rework" milestone stories, including identification of the original source milestone (e.g., 157 Rework milestone stories are sourced from "Milestone 03: Screening"). -- b) Satisfied – “V1 reporting and V2 Epics must be elaborated into Stories not later than February 28, 2025”. On February 28, 2025, the project submitted to the CDT materials intended to satisfy condition #1b. IPO reviewed the materials in March and determined that it satisfies the condition. CDT acknowledges that the V2 Baseline scope information must be kept "procurement confidential" now. The project is requested to provide the CDT: 1) An updated version of the V2 scope at the Epic/Scenario level immediately after the V2 PaaS SI contractor procurement is completed. (Date TBD) 2) An updated version of the V2 scope elaborated to the Story level immediately upon completion of V2 Business Requirements activities. (Date TBD) 2. Conduct annual Development Progress Demonstration for stakeholders and CDT during the first quarter of each Calendar year. -- Satisfied. The most recent annual demonstrations were held on April 4, 2024, May 7, 2025, and April 30, 2026. 3. Commence Earned Value Management (EVM) reporting in the monthly Project Status Reports (PSR) and Quarterly Project Reports (QPR) submissions beginning in October 2023. -- Satisfied. The Project began reporting EVM in October 2023. The Project continues to refine the approach and calculations using Function Point Equivalents. 4. Provide a Board of Directors-approved V1 Pilot Plan to the CDT upon completion of the SPR 6 Major Milestone in September 2023. -- Satisfied. The Project Director obtained Board of Directors approval on September 28, 2023, for the initial Pilot Plan version to satisfy the CDT SPR 6 approval condition. -- Board approval is conditional, stipulating that all future iterations be returned for approval. 5. The Independent Advisor (IA) consultant must assess the efficacy of the project’s constituent engagement, communications, and adoption model and provide a report that includes improvement recommendations to project leadership, the CalHHS, and the CDT by March 31, 2024. -- Satisfied. Per IPO request, the findings and recommendations were presented to executive stakeholders on June 3, 2024. 6. Provide an updated Vendor Management Plan that includes a revised Work Order Authorization (WOA) process that aligns with the PaaS SI and PVS vendor contract amendments described in SPR 6 before the amendments are executed. -- Satisfied. In August 2023, the CDT IPO team reviewed the new WOA Management Plan with updated WOA templates. -- Per IPO request, the WOA Management Plan was updated in October 2023 to include recurring activities, deliverables, and org readiness details for Implementation WOAs. 7. The CWS-CARES project must submit a new SPR if one or more of the following occurs: a) Estimated One-Time Cost increases by $15 million. b) Estimated Project End Date extends by three months. c) Product scope or requirements vary by 10 percent. d) Service Delivery Lifecycle (SDLC) undergoes major changes, as determined by the CDT. -- Condition has not been triggered
Corrective Action Green	Not currently applicable

• Special Project Report 6 (pdf)
• Special Project Report 5 (pdf)
• Special Project Report 4 (pdf)
• Special Project Report 3 (pdf)
• Special Project Report 2 (pdf)
• Special Project Report 1 (pdf)