There’s a certain aspect in which the “Medicaid Enterprise Solution” (MES) being sent out for bids (see full bid here) is a good thing: it seeks to integrate multiple systems that do not work in correspondence into a single one.  

And that’s pretty much where it ends, which is probably why, on a week in which we’ve heard of people waiting for ridiculously long hours, people having their benefits delayed during the worst of seasons, this has been sent on a Wednesday evening before a four day weekend.  

So what’s their solution?  More outsourcing:

The State intends to establish a public and private collaborative partnership with the Vendor to jointly develop the desired MES…  Emphasis should be placed on the most cost-effective and efficient suite of systems and services that allow the State to fully meet the needs of its citizenry now and into the future…

This piece is intended as preview, as I just got this bid last night and am posting this primarily to get it up and out there so it doesn’t get lost in the long weekend.  I am working on a longer, more detailed, piece which helps to translate some of the coded language in this proposal, as well as illustrates some pitfalls in this sort of proposal that the Shumlin administration will seriously need to think about before implementing it.