Travis County Commissioners Court
February 8, 2005
Item 11
On 11, that's pretty straightforward, isn't it in it's quantum merit claim. 11. Approve quantum meruit claim for city of Austin for Travis County's share of expenses related to the purchase of nextgen medical management system.
>> good morning, arlene tillman for health and human services. Back in February of '04 you approved an internal transfer of money within health and human services to cover this expenditure. The city kind of forgot to tell us that they had purchased this system. We went ahead and started drafting a contract and then it became apparent that services had already been delivered. So -- so on advice of legal, we just had the city prepare a quantum merit claim since it's pretty pointless to put a contract in place after the fact.
>> we do have funding for this?
>> yes, we do.
>> we did answer pit a contract.
>> -- we did anticipate a contract?
>> yes, we held it over in a liability account at the end of the fiscal year. It's in our health and human services budget right now, I think.
>> the equipment has been provided before the contract was executed.
>> yes.
>> the value of it equals the amount of the claim?
>> it's not equipment, it's software program that they -- that the both used. It has to do with patient accounting in the clinics.
>> the value of it equals the amount of the claim at least.
>> well, there was originally it was $98,000, which was to be taken care of over two years. Since we have the hospital district, the hospital district is taking care of the other 20,000. Within that budget.
>> why 72,000 instead of 7200, the same question asked another way.
>> pardon me.
>> what makes us think that 72,000 is reasonable?
>> based on invoices that we have from the software vendor. This is an electronic patient system, tracking system. So that if patients travel from one clinic to another or if they get over into brackenridge it can all be -- the files all transfer electronically so the doctors know what is happening with that patient.
>> I guess my only point is by law, I think that we have to find that the amount of the claim, $72,000, is consistent with the value that Travis County receives and your answer is yes, that's true.
>> we have invoices. What makes us think the invoices are valid?
>> well, this is our proportionate share of a total system that the city bought for all of the clinics. So based on the number of patients that we see in the city clinics, this would be the Travis County proportionate share. When we were under the old system for health care. If we had a contract it would be in this amount?
>> yes, it would.
>> I have the question a different way. We obviously had set aside money in the last fiscal year to do exactly this. Why didn't this occur in the last fiscal year?
>> I think just due to the time it was taking to get a contract together. We had -- getting input from purchasing and from the auditor and from legal and by the time you get those parties all to try to agree on what a contract might look like, it did take quite a bit of time. Why.
>> why did the city folk wait until February to let us know that this was out there.
>> I don't think that I can answer for the city.
>> one more time, it's like, you know, we were supposed to have like gotten everything in thaft still out -- that was still out there by December, good reason. It should take one quarter to kind of have all of the left over stuff. This was like the surprise not only did we not know that we were supposed to pay a proportionate share, then it doesn't even get turned over to us in a timely manner. I think everybody knows what my stance is on quantum merit claims, I don't vote for them because somebody has illegally and improperly I guess is a better word extended the county's credit to pay for something that was not contracted for by this Commissioners court, that's not how we do this. If we made a -- if we make a big deal about this, people get the idea that we are not supposed to do these things, my vote will be no for that very reason.
>> all right.
>> of course I feel the same way, one point that I think is at issue here it does it matter to you whether that system is going to go to the hospital district or not. If your thought is that this is what we would have paid for the system for clinics, that's what the hospital district is doing, I don't believe the city is turning this over to the hospital district. That would be my concern, it may not be a concern for you all. Our idea was what we did with the clinics went to the hospital districts. We were pretty good about turning all of that over. So, you know, one possibility is you pay this money to the hospital district, let them pay the city with the idea that it's part theirs.
>> this is provided by the county clinics?
>> yes.
>> does [indiscernible] know about this?
>> I don't think they do. We can certainly get them in the loop.
>> why don't we just take a week, find out from the city and the hospital district what the best course of action is. If -- if in fact this service I provided by the clinic, belongs to the hospital district, that this would as only -- was an obligation that we permitted to meet before October 1 it's just a matter of timing. The question is whether it makes sense to go ahead and pay the city or give the money to the hospital district and let the hospital district deal with the city. But what you are saying is that clearly had the contract been executed it would have been for this amount. The money has been budgeted. Service has been provided and it's just a matter of how to pay for it.
>> yes.
>> let me ask the question in a slightly different way. If this had been a system software, et cetera, that the Travis County had owned, would we have transferred this to the hospital district not only the system, but future obligations related to costs?
>> I would say yes because it's being used in the clinics to manage patients.
>> right.
>> so that raises a larger question of why this was not on an inventory list or if it is to get that confirmed because with may be, that doesn't mean that there's a $20,000 amount nor obligation that the hospital district has to pay for this equipment. We may be --
>> pass part of the -- that's part of the issue of why it was taking so long to try to get a contract together, because it's training, it's software licenses, it's the consultant's fee to -- to get the -- to get their software adapted to -- union you know, to tweak --
>> arlene, this is not a problem of our making.
>> right. To get back to the beginning of this, the city and the department went off and did this deal and then we get in at the tail end to try to figure out, we are not meeting everyone's deadlines because they have already bought the stuff. It's not necessarily because the county attorney, purchasers office and auditor's office insisted that we have a contract, it's that they didn't get us in until the last, until they had already bought this stuff basically.
>> it says the services and product have already been provided. The costs have been paid by the city in the above stated amount verbally agreed upon by city and county representatives. I assume we should know whether the services and product were provided before October 1 of 2004. Because we use that as pretty much a drop dead date for the county getting out of it and the hospital district stepping in. But there is there seems to be no question that the county agreed to this.
>> no, we brought it to you, it was when stephen was still here. It was back on February 10th of -- of 2004.
>> the contract is not timely. Had it been timely executed this would have been in '04.
>> yes. Out of all fairness to departed staff, nobody told us at the city. This was very end of the year, this was kind of a hoops that --
>> it raises questions about whether it's been properly transferred in terms of the --
>> I think that's a very valid question.
>> very valid question. We will get behind that.
>> I can hardly wait until next week to find out.
>> all right, we will turn with more.
>> but I must. We will have it back on the agenda. Let the city know that we will follow Commissioner Sonleitner lead and do the right lead.
>> thank you.
>> judge, let me ask I think that I heard two different things. Arlene did you say that first that the hospital district is the entity that is responsible for the differential of -- of the 72 versus the 98?
>> no, this -- you know, this has gone on for so long. The city may have agreed to finally absorb that. I would have to look back at all of the detail. But now that you are mentioning it, I think that the deal was they wanted the 98,000, we said the maximum we could even squeeze out of our last year's budget for health and human services was the 78, so I believe the city was going to just have to absorb the 20.
>> but now that the hot -- now the hospital district is in place, most likely it's going to be their responsibility.
>> the question is whether it was an asset that should have been transferred.
>> next year. It's an ongoing thing. Not just stopped because we paid for it.
>> obviously the hospital district needs to understand that there are probably -- they are probably going to be involved in this in some capacity.
>> I?m sure there's ongoing maintain and support for the software which should be one of their --
>> the contract that we drafted officially [inaudible - no mic] three year thing with the training, maintenance, all of that, two or three year. I think we went back and forth. What we were trying to just deal with was the first year, which is the one that was '04, which is --
>> we will be sure and let them know that this is an issue that they need to deal with.
>> yeah.
>> nothing similar to this still looming out there that hasn't resurfaced.
>> well, hopefully not. Because we have no more money, so --
>> those relationships that you stated on the tail end.
>> one more cleanup on item 34.
>> anyway, it may be still something out there -- but anyway we will -- you know --
>> going to be back on next week.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, February 9, 2005 9:04 AM