CWDS Bulletins

CARES SPOCs, Implementation Coordinators, OCM Coordinators, County Leadership, Tribe Leadership, Probation Leadership, and State Leadership:

In this Weekly Digest (click the link for more information):

• Register Now: CWS-CARES Stakeholder Briefing #5 
• Reminder: CWS-CARES Nine-Month County Readiness Checkpoint Meetings 
• December Holiday Observance at CWS-CARES

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Register Now: CWS-CARES Stakeholder Briefing #5

Registration for Stakeholder Briefing #5 on January 28, 2026 from 10 AM – 12 noon, is now available!  

This webinar series is an opportunity for all stakeholders (end users, county leadership, Tribal representatives, SPOCs, Implementation Coordinators, and more) to learn about CWS-CARES and engage directly with Project leadership. We encourage recipients to share this registration link to all staff who may be interested in attending.  

Registration takes less than a minute by entering your name, email, and county or organization. Once registration is complete, a meeting notice with the session information will be automatically sent to the email provided. We encourage everyone to register by January 26, 2026 using the following link: CWS-CARES Stakeholder Briefing #5: January 2026 | Registration. 

The January Briefing includes Team Updates, Product Demonstrations, and Q&A. See the full agenda below:

If you require any accommodations to attend this meeting, such as an ASL interpreter, please notify CWDS Customer Relations at: CWS_CustRel@otsi.ca.gov at least one week in advance, or as soon as possible. 

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Reminder: CWS-CARES Nine-Month County Readiness Checkpoint Meetings 

On Wednesday, December 3, 2025, the CWS-CARES Implementation Team sent an email announcing the upcoming 9-Month County Readiness Checkpoint Meetings. In January 2026, the Project Implementation Team will meet with each organization’s leadership to review critical path tasks and assess readiness for CWS-CARES Go-Live in October 2026.  These Checkpoints will occur during each county’s regular readiness meeting, unless adjustments are needed to accommodate leadership attendance. Implementation Leads (ILs) will coordinate with the Implementation Coordinators (ICs) prior to the January meetings.

There is no action needed prior to the meeting. The Implementation Team will collaborate directly with each organization’s Implementation Coordinators to update Readiness Checklists in advance of the January meeting.  

For more information regarding specific implementation readiness activities, please review the email sent on December 3, 2025, at 5:51PM, from the Implementation Mailbox to Child Welfare Directors, Deputy Directors, CARES Implementation Coordinators, and CARES SPOCs. 

Thank you for your continued support of CWS-CARES.

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December Holiday Observance at CWS-CARES

Happy Holidays from CWS-CARES! 

The Project will observe the Winter holiday on December 24 and 25, 2025. Please anticipate a delay in communications during this period.   

Due to the holidays, there will be no Weekly Digest email on Monday, December 22, 2025. Weekly Digest emails will resume on Monday, December 29, 2025.

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Share Your Feedback and Subscribe 

Thank you for following our progress! Share your feedback on this CWS-CARES Weekly Digest here: CWS-CARES Weekly Digest Feedback Form. Subscribe to future issues here: CWS-CARES Weekly Digest Subscription Form.  

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Action Required

We request that all CARES Single Point of Contacts (SPOCs) and Implementation Coordinators coordinate and distribute the CARES Weekly Digest to all staff impacted by CWS-CARES, at their discretion. 

December 15, 2025 UPDATE: The CWDS Infrastructure team expresses their appreciation for those who have joined the weekly Zscaler User Group meetings in November and December and for your continued engagement. Your participation helps keep our efforts on track to quickly identify and address any issues that arise.

Here are the newest questions and answers that arose from the most recent status meeting:

Q: When will the recordings of the previous Zscaler User Group meetings be saved to the CWDS website?
A: The CWDS Web team is working on receiving the necessary approvals. We will provide an update once the CWDS Infrastructure team receives word from the Web team.

Q: When will Zscaler be ready for customers to use?
A: Zscaler testing is nearly completed. An exact implementation date to use Zscaler should be provided by the next Zscaler User Group meeting on Friday, December 19, 2025.

Zscaler Client Connector Deployment Status
CWS Ops is nearing completion of the Zscaler Client Connector deployment across all workstations. Only a small number of workstations remain without the installation. For those machines, we kindly ask that you leave them powered on for an extended period to allow the deployment to complete. If you are a remote user and utilize Cisco AnyConnect, please ensure you are logged in so we can complete the installation successfully.

CWDS appreciates your cooperation and support for this project.

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November 24, 2025 UPDATE: The CWDS Infrastructure team appreciates your continued participation and support during this Zscaler migration project. Following our last status meeting on Friday, November 21, 2025, the team is pleased to share that they have made steady progress and are now moving forward with this project, as expected. Your ongoing engagement and valuable contributions play an essential role in helping to maintain momentum to achieve these shared goals. We remain grateful for your commitment and look forward to the continued collaboration.

Here are the newest questions and answers that arose from the most recent status meeting:

Q: When will additional Okta authentication login options be available?
A: As of Friday, November 21, 2025, users should have the ability to not have to rely on the ‘Okta Verify’ option from a mobile device. Users now have the ability to obtain the multi-factor authentication (MFA) one-time-use code through their email.

Q: Does this effort involving Zscaler and Okta affect the Server Based Computing (SBC) users login?
A: SBC users will continue to login as they normally do; this Zscaler/Okta effort has no impact on SBC.

Q: When can users expect to receive the email to create the Zscaler/Okta account?
A: Users should have already received an Okta account email from the CWDS Infrastructure team. If users have not yet received the email, please inform the CWDS Infrastructure team at cwsoperationsteam@otsi.ca.gov with the list of users who need to receive the account creation email. Please include the first name, last name, and the email address for each user on the list.

Q: When will the Zscaler client be installed on the CWS workstations?
A: Starting at 6:00 PM on Wednesday, November 26, 2025, the CWDS Infrastructure team and IBM/Kyndryl will start deploying the Zscaler Client Connector to the CWS workstation, using the BigFix installer. The installation process will use a rolling deployment, so as not to cause too large of impact to the network at one time.

If possible, please leave the CWS workstations powered on over the Thanksgiving holiday. Note: please also be connected to the Virtual Private Network (VPN) if the workstation uses VPN. This process will occur silently in the background.

Once completed, the user will notice the Zscaler application loaded on the workstation. This is an automatic loading process; however, no further action is needed as of this time. The user can close the Zscaler application to continue to do their daily work. Further instruction will be provided when Zscaler is expected to be in use. For now, this current activity is only to load the Zscaler application onto the workstation.

Please direct any questions regarding this process to the CWDS Customer Relations mailbox at CWS_CustRel@otsi.ca.gov.

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November 10, 2025 UPDATE: The CWDS Infrastructure team will be sending out emails to the Dedicated Counties to create their Zscaler accounts. The attached New User Guide Okta & Zscaler document will assist counties with solving any questions that Counties may have during the transition to Zscaler and Okta. The Infrastructure team will continue to leverage the Friday ‘CWS Ops Zscaler User Group’ meetings to communicate the next steps in this project and to answer any questions that the Counties may have.

Here are a couple questions and answers that arose from last week’s meeting:

Q: Will users that rely on Citrix to login into the CWS/CMS application be impacted when this Virtual Private Network (VPN) change occurs?
A: No impact will be reflected if a user is using Citrix to access the CWS/CMS application.

Q: Since Zscaler depends on the use of Okta, is it possible to receive directions outlining Okta verification process?
A: The attached New User Guide Okta & Zscaler document provides instructions on installing the “Okta verify application” function on iOS and Android mobile devices. The CWDS Infrastructure team is researching the possibility of installing the Okta application on the CWS/CMS workstations, but are currently requesting Dedicated Counties to allow the installation on mobile devices.

Action Required

The only action currently required of the Dedicated County is to create their Zscaler accounts when the email invite is delivered to their Outlook mailbox.

Please continue to attend the Zscaler meetings on Fridays in November and December to learn about the transition from AnyConnect VPN to Zscaler and to share any questions or concerns that you have regarding this project.

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The CWDS Infrastructure team, along with IBM/Kyndryl, currently use AnyConnect Virtual Private Network (VPN) for Dedicated County remote access to the CWS/CMS application. In an effort to achieve higher security standards and to move away from obsolete technologies, CWDS is switching to the Zscaler tool for remote access. Additionally, Zscaler will replace the McAfee proxy that is used to whitelist specific websites for the Dedicated Counties. In collaboration with Zscaler, CWDS will also use the Okta identity management tool.

Zscaler is a cloud native security platform that allows users to connect to applications and surf the internet securely. Okta is an identify management platform that allows user to securely authenticate to services.

The CWDS Infrastructure team will create accounts for all Dedicated County users. On November 19, 2025, IBM/Kyndryl will use the BigFix tool to deploy Zscaler on the Dedicated County workstations. Users will receive emails from Zscaler and Okta as the accounts are created and are rolled out to the workstations.

In December 2025, CWDS will transition from Cisco AnyConnect VPN and McAfee Proxy to Zscaler and Okta. In January 2026, the transition will be completed. Cisco AnyConnect VPN and McAfee Proxy will no longer be used; Dedicated Counties will be fully using only Zscaler and Okta.

To help users with the transition to Zscaler and Okta, the CWDS Infrastructure team will hold weekly meetings every Friday afternoon at 1:00 PM, beginning on November 7, 2025, and running through to the end of the calendar year. The CWDS Infrastructure team will use these meetings to cover the Zscaler project, why it is occurring, the timeline and activities, and to answer questions and concerns regarding the project.

Action Required

Please attend the Zscaler transition meetings, Fridays in November and December, to learn about the transition from AnyConnect VPN to Zscaler and to share any questions or concerns that you have regarding this project.

All Pilot County RFA Implementation Coordinators and SPOCs:

The CWS-CARES team has scheduled maintenance activity for the CWS-CARES production environment for Tuesday, December 16, 2025, beginning at 6:00 AM and concluding at 8:00 AM. During the maintenance window, the CWS-CARES Resource Family Approval (RFA) Application Submission, Review, and Approval Process will be accessible for pilot counties Fresno, Placer, and Santa Clara.

During the maintenance window, document related functionality in the CARES application will not be accessible.

Action Required

No action required from end-users during this maintenance window.

If users experience any issues with the CWS-CARES, please follow your county process for reporting issues. CWS-CARES County Administrators may contact the CARES Service Desk through the CWDS ServiceNow Customer Support Management (CSM) Portal. Alternate methods are phoning 1-855-292-3444 or via email at Servicedesk@cwds.ca.gov during normal business hours. You may also email after hours, and a Service Desk representative will contact you the next business day.  

All Dedicated County SPOCs and Technical Contacts:

December 12, 2025 UPDATE: The CWDS Infrastructure team successfully deployed the second of two network changes last night. Validation testing confirmed that the degraded initial login to the CWS/CMS application has been resolved. Users should not experience longer than usual connection time when connecting to the CWS/CMS application.

Please contact the IBM Help Desk (800-428-8268) to report any issues with CWS/CMS.

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The CWDS Infrastructure team deployed the first of two network changes last night. This change is causing a delay for users in some Dedicated Counties when they initially login to the CWS/CMS application. The extended login process takes impacted users an average of three to 25 seconds longer than a standard initial connection to CWS/CMS. The delayed connection occurs only during the initial connection; there is no observed delay with CWS/CMS following the login.

The CWDS Infrastructure is deploying the second part of the network change tonight. The initial login delay is expected to be removed following this second change.

Action Required

No action is needed for this activity.

If users experience any issues with CWS/CMS, please follow your county process for reporting issues or you may contact the IBM Boulder Help Desk at 1-800-428-8268.

All Dedicated County SPOCs and Technical Contacts:

The CWDS Infrastructure team deployed the first of two network changes last night. This change is causing a delay for users in some Dedicated Counties when they initially login to the CWS/CMS application. The extended login process takes impacted users an average of three to 25 seconds longer than a standard initial connection to CWS/CMS. The delayed connection occurs only during the initial connection; there is no observed delay with CWS/CMS following the login.

The CWDS Infrastructure is deploying the second part of the network change tonight. The initial login delay is expected to be removed following this second change.

Action Required

No action is needed for this activity.

If users experience any issues with CWS/CMS, please follow your county process for reporting issues or you may contact the IBM Boulder Help Desk at 1-800-428-8268.

All SPOCs and Technical Contacts:

EFFECTIVE December 15, 2025, CWS-CARES Interim RELEASE 0.17.1 PRODUCTION RELEASE IS PLANNED TO MOVE INTO PRODUCTION

The CWS-CARES team has scheduled release activity that will interrupt connectivity to the CWS-CARES Resource Family Approval (RFA) Application Submission, Review, and Approval Process for pilot counties Fresno, Placer, and Santa Clara. The release activity is planned to begin at 5:00 PM on December 15, 2025, and conclude at 6:30 PM. During this scheduled outage, users in pilot counties will not be able to access the CARES RFA application.

CWS-CARES Release 0.17.1:

The purpose of this release is to primarily deliver fixes for known issues, enhancements to behind-the-scenes functionality and security improvements to CWS-CARES Resource Family Approval (RFA) Application Submission, Review, and Approval Process.

CWDS is excited to share the new RFA features that are planned to be available following the implementation of CWS-CARES Release 0.17.1 on December 15, 2025, to the CARES-RFA Pilot County users. These new features are derived from user feedback as well as project planned enhancements.

RFA Application Process:

The RFA Application process is the Receipt, Record, Submission, and Assignment of an Application. The RFA Application process was selected as the first software build for CARES. CARES will ultimately replace the legacy Child Welfare System CWS/CMS. The RFA Application Process will operate in a totally new Production Environment without integrating with other legacy systems, such as the CWS/CMS and CARES-Live applications.

RFA Application Process Features:

• Allows an applicant or County staff member to initiate an emergency or standard application to become a resource family home
• Creates a facility profile that tracks required information to complete this process, including background check results, completion of orientation and training hours, physical home assessment, and family evaluation
• Aggregates information into a report to recommend approval or disapproval of a resource family application

Action Required

RFA Pilot County users review new features in the CWS-CARES Production Environment after December 16, 2025.

All prior Release Notes can be found here: RFA Application Process Release Notes and Interim Processes

All SPOCs, Technical Contacts, and SBC Administrators:

The California Department of Technology (CDT) has scheduled maintenance on Saturday, December 27, 2025, beginning at 6:00 AM and concluding at 10:00 AM. During the maintenance window, CDT will apply Standard Monthly OS Security Patches to SBCS Infrastructure Servers. There is no anticipated outage for this maintenance; however, CDT is asking that everyone log off from the Citrix SBC system, if not actively using it during the maintenance window.

Action Required

If users experience any issues with CWS/CMS, please follow your county process for reporting issues or you may contact the IBM Boulder Help Desk at 1-800-428-8268.

ALL SPOCs, Technical Contacts and CAD Contacts:

The California Department of Technology (CDT) has scheduled maintenance of the SAFE Cloud service. The maintenance begins on Saturday, December 20, 2025, at 8:00 PM and concludes on Sunday, December 21, 2025, at 2:00 AM. The activity will cause interruptions in the SAFE Cloud service. Some Business Objects (BO) reports will fail to send, or automated scripts may fail to retrieve from SAFE during this scheduled maintenance.

Action Required

All users should logoff of the SAFE Cloud service prior to the start of the stated maintenance timeframe. Please check on your scheduled BO SAFE reports and automated FTP scripts. If needed, re-run the reports and scripts.

Contact the IBM Help Desk (800-428-8268) to report any issues with your Business Objects content in SAFE.

All SPOCs and Technical Contacts:

To assist counties with cleanup of CWS/CMS user accounts and to correctly determine the number of accounts needed in CWS-CARES, an automated approach to deactivate inactive CWS/CMS user accounts has been proposed with System Change Request (SCR) 9039. To align with CWS-CARES user account administration, the SCR will deactivate user accounts that have not logged into CWS/CMS within the previous 90 days. Of the current 30,700 active user accounts in CWS/CMS, approximately 8,900 accounts have not logged in within the previous 90 days.

Important notes regarding this proposed automated process:

• All User IDs (active and inactive) will be migrated from CWS/CMS to CWS-CARES;
• The SCR will be developed outside of traditional CWS/CMS Release timelines;
• It is expected that a large first-run for deactivating CWS/CMS User IDs will be followed by a smaller run prior to moving to CWS-CARES;
• A county can change a user from inactive to active within CWS-CARES once migrated (provided a valid current email is used);
• Once CWS-CARES is live, the user accounts will automatically be deactivated if the user has not logged in a 90-day period.

Exact details on the functionality of the SCR are still being developed. Design and development is expected to be completed by the end of December 2025. After internal testing, the change is anticipated to run in the CWS/CMS production application by the end of January 2026. Updates will be provided as the details and schedule are finalized.

Action Required

Send questions and/or concerns regarding this automated process to the Data Quality portal’s mailbox at CWSDataQuality@otsi.ca.gov.

CARES SPOCs, Implementation Coordinators, OCM Coordinators, County Leadership, Tribe Leadership, Probation Leadership, and State Leadership:

In this Weekly Digest (click the link for more information): 

• CWS-CARES Progress and Engagement Summary: November 
• Reminder: Product Demonstrations Now Available on the CWDS Website 

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CWS-CARES Progress and Engagement Summary: November 

The November Progress and Engagement Summary is now available on the CWDS website. Each monthly summary includes the following data from the previous month: 

• Participation rates for key meetings 
• A list of product demos and topics covered, by date 
• Updates from teams across the Project   

We encourage you to review and share the November CWS-CARES Progress and Engagement Summary with your teams. 

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Reminder: Product Demonstrations Now Available on the CWDS Website 

Core Constituent Demonstrations are now available to view on the new Product Demonstrations Page on the CWDS Website. Access requires logging in with your organization’s email address. 

Core Constituent Demonstration meetings will be scheduled at least two weeks in advance of the session with clear agendas in the invitations. Changes to the agenda will be communicated at least two days prior to the session. 

These updates are a direct result of your feedback to enhance the process of accessing Core Constituent Demonstrations. Thank you for your continued partnership! 

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Share Your Feedback and Subscribe 

Thank you for following our progress! Share your feedback on this CWS-CARES Weekly Digest here: CWS-CARES Weekly Digest Feedback Form. Subscribe to future issues here: CWS-CARES Weekly Digest Subscription Form.  

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Action Required

We request that all CARES Single Point of Contacts (SPOCs) and Implementation Coordinators coordinate and distribute the CARES Weekly Digest to all staff impacted by CWS-CARES, at their discretion.