CARS is intended to transform the filing process for campaign finance and lobbying activity from the current paper/FTP/online hybrid model to “a fully online data-driven and content-oriented service model,” according to the Secretary of State’s Office.
“Features include a more intuitive interface, the ability to accept electronic signatures as allowed by statute, and a mechanism for paying fees/fines online,” the department says in the October newsletter. “The new system will increase accuracy by automating validation and verification based on consistent business rules.”
The Secretary of State’s Office says it will publish newsletters about every two months.
Summing up activities to date this year, the October newsletter highlights the following:
- January: The CARS project chose Salesforce as the new platform “that would best meet project goals.”
- February through July: The project welcomed “a new project management team and system implementation consultants; validated requirements and project scope; created a new project schedule; and adopted a new Agile system development methodology.”
- July and August: The new project team “kicked off the restart by holding meetings with the Secretary of State’s Office Political Reform Division (PRD) staff, the previously chartered Stakeholder Input Group, software vendors and service providers. The team also invited software vendors’ meeting-specific criteria to participate in a small Software Vendor Subgroup for validating requirements for the Application Programming Interface (API).”
