OSI's Boule Leaving to Join CalACES

John Boule, who has been director of the state’s Office of Systems Integration since February 2014, has accepted a new position as executive director of the California Automated Consortium Eligibility System (CalACES) Project.

Boule’s last day will be Dec. 22, he said in an announcement to his staff.

“It has been an honor and a privilege to serve as your Director for the last three and a half years,” his announcement said. “Together we have accomplished a tremendous amount and have served our Agency and sponsor departments well. I am so proud of your commitment to public service, and your ability to achieve great things through your ingenuity, dedication, passion and compassion. I will be working with our Agency on succession planning in the coming weeks and will let you know when decisions are made.”

Peter Kelly is chief deputy director of OSI.

CalACES, Boule said, “is a great project that has the potential to reshape human service delivery and the information technology landscape across our state.”

CalACES came into being in September as a result of a merger of Los Angeles County with the C-IV Consortium, which serves California counties.

The joint-powers entity will have about 200 staff members and a $215 million budget for FY 2017-18, and will support a combined user base of about 40,000 county human-services personnel, providing benefits and services to more than 9 million Californians each month. 

CalACES currently has projects involving CalWORKS/TANF, CalFresh/SNAP, Medi-Cal/Medicaid, Welfare-to-Work, Foster Care, General Assistance/General Relief and Child Care. The CalACES website lists its upcoming projects:

• Migration Development & Implementation project, which will migrate the 39 C-IV Counties to Los Angeles County’s Leader Replacement System (LRS ), scheduled to begin in January 2018 and conclude by August 2020.
• LRS Maintenance & Enhancements
• C-IV Maintenance & Operations
• Procurement for Planning of CalACES Maintenance & Operations Collaboration in the interoperability of CalACES system into a single statewide case management system.

In his new role, Boule will have 11 direct reports, including project directors and regional project managers.

"As I return to the counties," he said in his farewell note to the OSI staff, "I do so with a greater appreciation and knowledge of the outstanding work being done at OSI in service to our Agency and sponsor departments. The lessons I have learned as your Director will be key factors as I collaborate with the counties, state partners and federal partners to make the CalACES Project a success."

According to his biography on the OSI website, Boule previously served as the project director for the Statewide Automated Welfare System, Consortium IV (C-IV), from 2005-March 2014. During his tenure with C-IV, the Project and Consortium expanded from serving four counties to currently serving 39 California counties. Boule held multiple positions with the First Data Corp., which included work with the Welfare Client Data System (WCDS) Consortium on the CalWIN Project. While at First Data Corp., Boule also worked extensively with the Interim Statewide Automated Welfare System (ISAWS) Consortium prior to its migration to C-IV.

Before coming to California in 1999, Boule worked for the Arizona Attorney General’s Office as well as the Department of Economic Security, where he held multiple positions from 1990-99 including welfare reform implementation manager, executive staff assistant and regional program manager.