Herrera: All systems should be online Thursday

Posted 7/01/2009 09:10:00 PM

Secretary of State Mary Herrera said late today that the computer systems in her office that enable database searches and Uniform Commercial Code filings should be back online Thursday.

Herrera wrote in an e-mail that those systems were being tested today, and her office is “optimistic that this functionality will be operational on Thursday.”

Officials have been working to restore the Secretary of State’s Web site and systems in the office since last week, when unspecified problems knocked out a new campaign finance and disclosure system that has been under development. Officials haven’t specified how the problems with the new site relate to the office’s problems with its other computer systems and Web site.

Parts of the Web site went back online today, but not the database and UCC systems that are necessary for the public to do all sorts of business, from accessing campaign and lobbyist information to registering trademarks and other dealings between businesses and state government.

Herrera, commenting for the first time about the problems, reiterated in the e-mail what officials from her office said last week: The problems did not result in information that is stored in the office’s databases being lost.

“There are no changes to the data, we are secured from potential vulnerabilities and everything is backed up,” Herrera wrote in the e-mail. “You can be assured that all systems remain intact.”

As for the new campaign finance and disclosure system, which I and others were able to preview just before everything crashed, Herrera had only this to say: “The campaign system is in development.”

As it has been for quite some time.