Date: January 27, 2026
TO: Board of Supervisors
SUBMITTED BY: Sanja Bugay, Director, Department of Social Services
SUBJECT: Retroactive Purchase of PBDS Maintenance and Enhancement Services through the CalSAWS Consortium and Deloitte Consulting, LLP and Termination of Agreement No. 25-312
RECOMMENDED ACTION(S):
TITLE
1. Approve and authorize the Director of the Department of Social Services, and/or designee to retroactively terminate Agreement No. 25-312 with the CalSAWS Consortium and Accenture, LLP, effective November 1, 2025, pursuant to the transition notice received following the CalSAWS Consortium’s decision to discontinue its separate service provision Agreements with Accenture, LLP;
2. Under Administrative Policy No. 34 for competitive bids or requests for proposals (AP 34), determine that an exception to the competitive bidding requirement under AP 34 is satisfied and a Sole Source Acquisition is warranted due to unusual or extraordinary circumstances, and that the best interests of the County would be served by entering into an Agreement with the CalSAWS Consortium and Deloitte Consulting, LLP, as the CalSAWS Consortium is a Joint Powers Authority formed by all 58 California Counties; and
3. Approve and authorize the Chairman to execute a retroactive County Purchase Agreement with the CalSAWS Consortium and Deloitte Consulting, LLP for the purchase of Purpose-Built, Curated Data Set (PBDS) Maintenance and Enhancements (M&E) support, effective November 1, 2025, through May 31, 2026, total cost not to exceed ($119,476).
REPORT
There is no increase in Net County Cost associated with the recommended actions. Approval of the recommended actions will allow the Department to continue services with the California Statewide Automated Welfare System (CalSAWS) Consortium and Deloitte Consulting, LLP (Deloitte) for PBDS for M&E support. PBDS allows the Department to create customized reporting and analysis of Social Services workload and productivity data. The cost of the purchase will be offset primarily through existing State and Federal allocated funds. This item is countywide.
ALTERNATIVE ACTION(S):
Should your Board not approve the recommended actions, the Department will lose the ability to request maintenance support when issues arise and will not receive necessary updates to keep the system functional and aligned with departmental needs. The Department will continue to have access to PBDS through its separate infrastructure agreement with the CalSAWS Consortium and Gainwell Technologies, LLC (Gainwell); however, without M&E support, system performance may decline over time.
SUSPENSION OF COMPETITION/SOLE SOURCE CONTRACT:
It is requested that the County find under AP No. 34 that an exception to the competitive bidding requirement is satisfied, and a sole source is warranted due to unusual or extraordinary circumstances, as the CalSAWS Consortium is a Joint Powers Authority formed for the management of CalSAWS on behalf of all 58 California counties. The Joint Powers Authority has procured the software, maintenance, and any necessary equipment support of PBDS. PBDS cannot be procured independently elsewhere. The General Services Department -Purchasing concurs with the Department’s assessment that this satisfies the exception to the competitive bidding process required by AP 34.
RETROACTIVE AGREEMENT:
This recommended agreement is retroactive to November 1, 2025, as the Department received initial notification of the transition on October 24, 2025, and subsequently received the new agreement from the CalSAWS Consortium on November 14, 2025. The signed M&E Confirmation of Completion and Transition letter was received on December 4, 2025. The agreement is being presented to your Board at the earliest possible date.
FISCAL IMPACT:
There is no increase in Net County Cost associated with the recommended actions. The maximum cost of the recommended agreement ($119,476) will be fully offset with State and Federal Social Services Funds ($106,461), 2011 Realignment ($2,282) in lieu of State General Funds for Foster Care Eligibility that was realigned to counties through Assembly Bill 118 (Chapter 40, Statutes of 2011), 1991 Social Services Realignment ($9,073), and the required Net County Cost ($1,660) which offsets the General Relief Program share of cost. Sufficient appropriations and estimated revenues are included in the Department’s Org 5610 FY 2025-26 Adopted Budget.
DISCUSSION:
On March 12, 2019, the Board approved Agreement No. 19-129 and Agreement No. 19-130 with the CalSAWS Consortium, a Joint Powers Authority, to allow the CalSAWS Consortium to oversee activities and the management of CalSAWS, such as the design, procurement, development, implementation, migration, ongoing operation, and system maintenance, on behalf of all 58 California counties. The Department requests for additional CalSAWS support to follow the existing processes within the Consortium agreement and are represented as “Additional County Purchase Requests/Agreements”. The additional services can only be purchased through CalSAWS Consortium contracted vendors.
On April 23, 2024, the Board approved Agreement No. 24-193 with the CalSAWS Consortium for the purchase of PBDS access and technical training from Accenture, the vendor selected by the CalSAWS Consortium. Accenture provided Infrastructure, M&E support, and technical training on generating, customizing, and interpreting reports within the CalSAWS system.
On January 28, 2025, the Board approved Agreement No. 25-030 with the CalSAWS Consortium and Gainwell for the purchase of PBDS access, Infrastructure and technical training, and Amendment I to Agreement No. 24-193 with the CalSAWS Consortium and Accenture for PBDS M&E support. The County was required to separate the initial PBDS agreement into two separate agreements due to the CalSAWS Consortium ending its contract with Accenture for infrastructure support services. Accenture infrastructure and training concluded January 31, 2025, while its M&E support extends through July 31, 2025. Gainwell was selected by the CalSAWS Consortium to provide Infrastructure and training starting February 1, 2025.
On June 24, 2025, the Board approved Amendment II to Agreement No. 24-193 with the CalSAWS Consortium and Accenture, extending services from August 1, 2025 through January 31, 2026. The extension was necessary because Deloitte required additional time before taking over responsibility for M&E support, with the transition expected to begin February 1, 2026.
Approval of the recommended action will allow the Department to receive continued M&E support for PBDS. These services ensure ongoing data accuracy and system adaptability, enabling the Department to meet evolving operational needs while improving efficiency, effectiveness, and transparency. As the CalSAWS Consortium transitioned responsibilities from Accenture to Deloitte on October 24, 2025, the Department was required to terminate the current active agreement (A-25-312) with Accenture. The Department received the letter confirming this transition on December 4, 2025. The new agreement with Deloitte will be retroactively effective from November 1, 2025 through May 31, 2026.
PBDS access from CalSAWS provides curated data from the County’s Amazon S3 account, specifically filtered to the County of Fresno. PBDS enables the Department to develop customized reporting and analysis of Public Assistance data, applying conditions in accordance with Department workload management needs.
CalSAWS provides the Department with the Enterprise Data Repository (EDR) environment along with all 58 counties in which the Department’s IT division filters pre-defined datasets to obtain data that pertains to Fresno County daily for use in the Department’s current reporting infrastructure Oracle Business Intelligence (Oracle BI). The Department currently faces challenges with the CalSAWS reporting environment, due to the added time required to obtain and filter County specific data, limitations met with CalSAWS pre-defined reports, and the need for workarounds to combine data. Requests to modify current pre-defined CalSAWS reports can be an extensive process, requiring a Service Request and approval from all 58 counties. The EDR environment is built from a PBDS.
The County Purchase Agreement deviates from the County’s standard contract language as it was developed by the CalSAWS Consortium.
REFERENCE MATERIAL:
BAI #74, June 24, 2025
BAI #59, January 28, 2025
BAI #48, April 23, 2024
BAI #50, March 12, 2019
ATTACHMENTS INCLUDED AND/OR ON FILE:
Sole Source Acquisition Request
On file with Clerk - Agreement with the CalSAWS Consortium and Deloitte
CAO ANALYST:
Ronald Alexander