A $220 million state computer system designed to simplify Colorado’s welfare benefits system is so complex that it confused federal regulators trying to figure how much Colorado overpaid food-stamp clients, state lawyers argued this week before a federal appeals board.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service wants Colorado to repay $11.1 million in food-stamp benefits allegedly overpaid in fiscal year 2005.
Both governments blamed the Computer Benefits Management System for the problems.
Federal officials said the overpayment was the result of computer glitches and human errors in the new welfare-tracking system.
Colorado said the federal government’s numbers were wrong because officials misinterpreted CBMS data.
“The complexity of CBMS makes it very hard to someone not versed in it to understand it,” said Wade Livingston, the assistant attorney general who argued Colorado’s case before the State Food Stamps Appeal Board on Monday and Tuesday. “I’d not disagree that there is a certain irony in all this.”
One state official described a variety of federal miscalculations to the three-person board caused by CBMS.
For example, one food-stamp recipient supposedly received thousands of dollars in benefits when the person was eligible for only a few hundred. What really happened, according to Sue McGinn, director of the state’s food-stamp program, was a CBMS program glitch that caused the excess amount to be credited and refunded several times.
As the amount ping-ponged from one column to the next, the federal agency counted each as an overpayment. In the end, McGinn said, the overpayment never happened and the food-stamp client received only the amount the recipient was entitled to get.
This type of miscalculation occurred several times, McGinn told the board.
Livingston said overpayments are part of the process and Colorado is no different from other states. What is different this time is the relentless pursuit for an amount that’s wrong.
“FNS never came after us for that before,” Livingston said of the overpayments. “Why are they starting now and for an amount completely wrong?”
A decision by the board on the appeal isn’t expected for 30 days, and the state can appeal again in court.
In a related development Thursday, Gov. Bill Ritter dissolved the office overseeing CBMS, returning it to the Departments of Human Services and Health Care Policy and Financing. The move saves taxpayers $200,000 a year, Ritter said.
Staff writer David Migoya can be reached at 303-954-1506 or dmigoya@denverpost.com.
