CMDP Development Update,

By Will Bowman, CMDP Project Manager

Since the last CMDP update in summer 2015, the CMDP project team has made significant progress in developing the application and supporting components. Below is a summary of accomplishments and next steps on pilot testing the submission of sample results to the CMDP as well as testing additional CMDP functionality such as Profile Management and System Administration. The “go live” date for CMDP remains September 2016.

Development Sprints Completed as of December 2015.

From June through December, the sprint team, comprising 5 state Subject Matter Experts (SMEs), EPA staff and Attain, completed development sprints focusing on the following CMDP modules and functionality:

•  Laboratory and Water System Profiles: The Profiles are the read-only view of a subset of inventory and legal entity data elements for each laboratory and water system, and Profile Change requests may be made by a laboratory or a water utility when one of the values of a data element in a Profile should change. States may review the Profile change requests in their CMDP dashboards and approve them through System Administration.
•  Sample Job Preparation, Workflow and Submittal. This module represents the core functionality of the CMDP, which is to support the electronic reporting of drinking water sample results to state primacy agencies in the form of a sample “job.” Web forms have been created for the following categories: microbiological, chemical/radiological (including composite samples), Cryptosporidium, and operational samples.
•  Search Samples. This module supports searching for any submitted sample jobs by a one or more of a broad range of criteria, e.g., Job ID, Job Status, Water System Name, Water System ID, Facility, Collection Date Range, Sample ID, Sample Type, Sample Category, Analyte, Laboratory ID, etc.
•  Shared CROMERR Services (SCS) and CMDP Integration: Focuses on ensuring that the CMDP as an electronic reporting application is CROMERR compliant. All user management, and nearly all CROMERR functionality, will occur in OEI’s Shared CROMERR Services (SCS) environment.
• State, Laboratory and Water Utility Dashboards: These are the landing pages for each CMDP user type that allows a lab or utility to view draft and final submittals (states only see final submittals), links to Profiles associated with the user, and any change requests.
• System Administration: Through this component of the CMDP, states will have the ability to manage and approve Profile change requests, and configure system e-mail notifications.

SCS CROMERR application streamlined

Another important feature of CMDP is the streamlined application process. Because CMDP uses all EPA Shared CROMERR Services for its CROMERR functionality, the CROMERR application for CMDP comprises a letter or e-mail to OEI noting that the state: plans to implement CMDP, confirms that it has not made changes to the core CROMERR functionality provided by CMDP/SCS, and that it wants EPA to take action on its request to use CMDP.

Pilot States have Completed Several Key Preparatory Activities

Since last fall, the seven CMDP pilot states (CT, KS, LA, OR, PA, RI, UT) have been coordinating with EPA and Attain on the following activities:

•  Obtaining state management and (where applicable) IT department approval: All states have approval to participate in the pilot and intend to be among the first states to adopt the CMDP when it is ready to receive official compliance results
• Submitting streamlined CROMERR applications: All pilot states except Oregon already had an approved Attorney General certification (AG cert) on file with OEI, which along with OGC and OECA has confirmed that these AG certs are applicable to CMDP pending a letter from the state attesting to their plans to use CMDP. OEI has drafted an AG certification letter for Oregon and is coordinating completion of the AG certification by April 2016. Once Oregon has an AG cert on file, Oregon’s application process will be as streamlined as the other 6 pilot states.
• Migrating Inventory and Legal Entity Data from S/State to CMDP: All of the necessary laboratory and water system information from the 6 pilot states using SDWIS/State has been migrated into the CMDP for the pilot. As a result, for these states and their pilot participants, the Lab and PWS Profiles will be available during the pilot, as will all sample “meta-data” that depends on the migrated water system data, e.g.., PWS ID, Facility ID, Sample Point ID.
• Recruiting Pilot Participants: states have been recruiting labs and utilities to participate and to identify which historical sample results each participant should test.

Pilot Testing Process and Schedule

Below is the Compliance Monitoring Database Portal (CMDP) Pilot Testing schedule and activities related to getting the data into the CMDP using three different methods of reporting (web forms, LIMS/web services, Excel templates). The pilot will occur in three phases over several months

• Phase 0 – Testers register in SCS to obtain CMDP credentials and receive an overview of the application prior to testing.
• Phase 1 – Three consecutive stages to test the CMDP and provide feedback to EPA/Attain. Each stage corresponds to a method of entering data into CMDP, using historical sample results. We begin in March with web forms testing and test each method of reporting sequentially, moving next to LIMS and then templates, using historical sample results. On average, testers will have 2 weeks to test functionality and Attain will have 2 weeks to assess feedback and repair any defects identified. Phase 1 continues until mid-June.
• Phase 2 – Users retest confirmed defects from Round 1 and provide feedback to EPA/Attain. Phase 2 begins in late June, at which time we’ll retest each method of reporting in the same sequence using the same historical sample results, but focusing our efforts on specific defects from Phase 1 to see if they were correctly repaired. On average, testers will have 1 week to retest and 2 weeks for Attain to make additional modifications and improvements based on the retest results. Phase 2 ends in mid-August.

I will provide another blog update on the CMDP pilot after we’re underway.