State legislators have ordered an investigation of the California State University system?s purchase of a $400 million computer software program.

Sen. Richard Alarcon, D-San Fernando, and Assemblyman Manny Diaz, D-San Jose, requested that the Joint Legislative Audit Committee investigate the Common Management System.

The CMS project, initiated in 1996, will replace some of the key administrative information systems at all CSU campuses with new PeopleSoft software.

“The project is designed to update, standardize and consolidate the human resources, financial management and student information systems for the 23 CSU campuses,” said Andrew Lyons, a research analyst with the California Faculty Association, the faculty association that asked the lawmakers to request the audit.

The CMS project has started at campuses such as CSU Northridge and is contracted to PeopleSoft, a worldwide software corporation in Pleasanton, Calif. for seven years and $400 million.

That seems like a lot of bucks for a little bang to Lyons.

“The cost of this project is one of our major concerns because the money used for this project will come from funds that we already have, reallocating the funds from every aspect of expenses,” Lyons said.

And the project might not be working as well as it should, according to Northridge State workers who say PeopleSoft is inefficient and incompatible with other CSU programs.

“Many people complain that the PeopleSoft servers are uncooperative and not usually running. We?ve found that a lot of the administrative work that used to take a day to process is now taking longer, even after incorporating this new system,” said Dennis Dillon, chapter president at CSUN.

The CSU Chancellor?s Office has heard of the complaints, but stands by PeopleSoft.

“The CSU system welcomes the audit, knowing that the CMS project and PeopleSoft will come out of the audit looking good,” said Colleen Bentley Adler, spokeswoman for the Chancellor?s office.

“New programs always generate complaints but PeopleSoft was the best corporation that we found. If the audit produces that that project has problems, then we?ll fix them as they come up,” she said.

The California State Employees Association, which represents computer programmers and operators in California, also criticized the contract for operating the database out of state.

“During a time of economic downturn, does it make sense to export jobs that are needed here?” said Teven Laxer, with the CSEA.

Dillon is also upset that the storage facility is based in Utah and not in California.

“We are basically taking California money and sending it to Utah, it just doesn?t make sense,” Dillon said.

Laxer said the audit, which will begin in May and take up to nine months, has been approved in order to prevent CSU campuses from making the same mistake that the Department of Informational Technology made in regards to their Oracle pact.

A state audit released this month found that the state?s deal with San Jose-based Oracle could cost as much as $41 million more than if there had been no contract, according to the Bureau of State Audit?s Web site.

“There is a huge contracting problem with Oracle. There is a large amount of money involved but not a lot of software needed. We?re expecting one software company to provide for all CMS needs? To me, it seems better to go with individual companies who have a better reputation doing a certain section than trying to use a large corporation,” Laxer said.

The faculty union is also concerned that the project won?t have sufficient safeguards against runaway costs.

“Without those departments involved, there is no one to keep watch on how the program is doing or how all this money is being used. That is a huge chunk of money that we need to keep track of to make sure it?s being used correctly,” Lyons said.

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