MTA Software Doesn’t Compute, Audits Say

A new $29-million computer software system at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority has been causing major problems and delaying repairs at bus maintenance facilities by sending wrong orders for engine parts, according to agency audits and memos.

Employees’ complaints, in documents obtained by the Times, portray the M3 computer system as being so error-prone that it botched simple calculations about how many parts were needed for bus repairs.

MTA officials acknowledge that the system has had problems but said they are trying to fix them.

“We’re now working out the kinks,” said Elizabeth Bennett, who oversees the MTA’s information technology.

The Maintenance and Materiel Management System, or M3, is intended to coordinate equipment for buses and trains, order parts from a robotized warehouse, schedule repairs, process some payroll and track work schedules.

Parts of the system were implemented at maintenance yards last year. Other components will launch in the coming months.

When approved by the MTA board in January 2003, the system cost about $24 million -- $21 million for the software’s developer, Oakland-based Spear Technologies, and $3 million in other expenses. The project’s cost has risen to $28.8 million, after an increase that MTA officials blame on an earlier accounting error.

Spear Technologies officials did not return calls seeking comment.

Still more money will be needed to complete the project, MTA officials say.

Last November, MTA chief financial officer Richard Brumbaugh outraged board members when he asked for an additional $4.5 million to complete the project, which is now nine months behind schedule. Brumbaugh has withdrawn that request and says he will provide the board with new cost estimates in the next few weeks.

“I was really concerned that [problems with M3] could forebode wider issues,” said MTA board member John Fasana, who has seen some of the internal reports critical of the project.

A Nov. 30, 2004, memo, written by maintenance manager Michael Singer to Milo Victoria, deputy executive officer for operations, provided anecdotes and workers’ quotes about their experiences with the computer software.

“M3 can’t do the math,” lamented an equipment maintenance supervisor, explaining how the MTA’s old computer system correctly tabulated the number of crankshafts required to rebuild air conditioners. The new software sputtered when called to the task.

“Before M3, approximately 95% of our engine-rebuild shop orders had all the parts we needed to build the engine. Now, after M3, approximately 90% of our orders are incomplete,” said another equipment supervisor.

“My leader and I spend approximately three hours every day chasing parts” to rectify M3’s mistakes, said a supervisor at the MTA’s transmission shop, also quoted in the memo.

Brumbaugh, however, said the problems have led to a “minimal loss of productivity.”

More than a year ago, the MTA’s audit department began warning about what it said was a lack of quality control over the software’s development.

A Nov. 15, 2004, audit memo to MTA executives said the software’s payroll program performed poorly in tests.