DATE: June 24, 2025
TO: Board of Supervisors
SUBMITTED BY: Sanja Bugay, Director, Department of Social Services
SUBJECT: Purchase of English and Spanish Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) and Extension of Purpose-Built Data Systems (PBDS)
RECOMMENDED ACTION(S):
TITLE
1. 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 Gainwell Technologies, LLC as the CalSAWS Consortium is a Joint Powers Authority formed by all 58 California Counties;
2. Approve and authorize the Chairman to execute the County Purchase Agreement with the CalSAWS Consortium and Gainwell Technologies, LLC for the purchase of English and Spanish Generative AI for post-call summarization on behalf of the County, effective August 1, 2025, through May 31, 2026, total cost not to exceed $308,854; and
3. Approve and authorize the Chairman to execute Second Amendment to Agreement No. 24-193 with the CalSAWS Consortium and Accenture, LLP for the purchase of Purpose-Built, Curated Data Set (PBDS) access and Maintenance and Enhancements (M&E) support, extending the term from August 1, 2025, to January 31, 2026, and increasing the maximum by $127,722 to a total of $587,981.
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 Gainwell Technologies, LLC for English and Spanish Generative AI for post-call summarization to improve call handling efficiency and PBDS access will allow the Department to create customized reporting and analysis of Social Services workload. The cost for 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’s Contact Center will use manual summarization of call transcription. Without English and Spanish Generative AI services, the Department will forego the opportunity to take advantage of the increased efficiency and improved overall call handling times afforded by an automated real-time transcription service for English and Spanish language clients.
Additionally, the Department will lose access to PBDS curated data. The Department will be unable to extract data specific to the County of Fresno from the Enterprise Data Repository (EDR), or create modified reports and workarounds based on the limitations of existing pre-defined CalSAWS reporting.
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 English and Spanish Generative AI and PBDS. English and Spanish Generative AI and PBDS cannot be procured independently elsewhere. The Internal Services Department - Purchasing concurs with the Department’s assessment that this satisfies the exception to the competitive bidding process required by AP 34.
FISCAL IMPACT:
There is no increase in Net County Cost associated with the recommended actions. The maximum cost of the recommended agreement ($896,835) will be fully offset with State and Federal Social Services Funds ($797,803), 2011 Realignment ($18,518) 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 ($63,750), and the required Net County Cost ($16,764) 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 Recommended Budget and will be included within subsequent budget requests.
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 March 19, 2024, the Board approved Agreement No. 24-136 with the CalSAWS Consortium to purchase Generative AI for post-call summarization for English language clients. The Department’s Contact Center implemented Generative AI to all staff in July 2024. The Department considered including Spanish language Generative AI with the initial County Purchase, but this feature was still under development and not ready for deployment.
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 December 17, 2024, the Board approved Agreement No. 24-136 with the CalSAWS Consortium to purchase Generative AI for post-call summarization for Spanish language clients. Spanish GenAI automatically transcribes the Spanish language conversation into English text, helping to reduce wait times, increase the number of clients served and provide equitable call handling times for both English and Spanish-speaking clients. Spanish Generative AI was available to staff February 2025.
On January 28, 2025, the Board approved Agreement No. 25-030 with the CalSAWS Consortium and Accenture 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 access and 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. Accenture Infrastructure and training concluded January 31, 2025, while its M&E support extends through July 31, 2025. Due to extended contract negotiations with Deloitte, the vendor selected to replace Accenture, there is a need to extend M&E services provided by Gainwell from August 1, 2025, through January 31, 2026. Gainwell was selected by the CalSAWS Consortium to provide Infrastructure and training starting February 1, 2025.
On May 6, 2025, the Board approved Agreement No. A-25-178 with the CalSAWS Consortium to purchase Generative AI for post call summarization for Spanish and English. This item allowed for Fresno to have continued access to Generative AI services for the two-month period where CalSAWS transitions from Accenture to Gainwell, effective August 1, 2025. This agreement also combined English and Spanish into one contract and sought to reduce overall cost for Generative AI services.
Approval of the recommended action will allow the Department to extend ongoing worker support for both English and Spanish through a Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) solution. This is expected to reduce the time a worker spends on a call by approximately ten to fifteen minutes, as the AI solution automatically transcribes the client conversation. The ten-month duration of this agreement will conclude May 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. This enhances data accuracy and adaptability, enabling the Department to meet its evolving needs while improving efficiency, effectiveness, and transparency. Approval of the recommended action will allow the Department to extend M&E services provided by Accenture from August 1, 2025, through January 31, 2026, until Deloitte assumes responsibility for M&E services on February 1, 2026.
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 #40, May 6, 2025
BAI #59, January 28, 2025
BAI #85, December 17, 2024
BAI #48, April 23, 2024
BAI #50, March 19, 2024
BAI #50, March 12, 2019
ATTACHMENTS INCLUDED AND/OR ON FILE:
Sole Source Acquisition Request Form
On file with Clerk - Agreement with CalSAWS Consortium ENG/SPN Generative AI
On file with Clerk - Second Amendment to Agreement with CalSAWS Consortium
CAO ANALYST:
Ronald Alexander