Arizona governor vetoes bill mandating statewide cloud migration

Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey has vetoed a bill that would have compelled the state’s agencies to begin a massive migration to the cloud.

State Sen. Don Shooter’s S.B. 1434 unanimously passed the House and the Senate earlier this month, but Ducey killed the legislation once it reached his desk.

In a letter to lawmakers explaining his decision, Ducey acknowledged that “it’s time for state government to enter the 21st century, and major advances in technology are needed to get there,” but he doesn’t believe Shooter’s legislation is the right way forward for Arizona.

“This bill appears to add extra layers of bureaucracy that are unnecessary and will stall needed advancements in technology,” Ducey wrote.

[Read more: Chattanooga hopes to eliminate all desktops with move to cloud]

Specifically, the bill would have charged state agencies with starting a “two-year hardware, platform and software refresh evaluation cycle,” and examining the efficacy of moving its services to the cloud as part of that process. Agencies would have been able to consider private providers, or built their own cloud models, so long as they conformed to the standards laid out by the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

The legislation would have given the state’s Department of Administration the authority to oversee every agency’s migration of services to the cloud, requiring that each agency deliver a cloud migration plan to the department by the start of 2017.

But with Ducey’s veto, the legislation is dead for the foreseeable future. Arizona’s Legislature adjourned May 6, and Shooter didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from StateScoop on whether he plans to introduce similar legislation in the next session.

Contact the reporter at alex.koma@statescoop.com, and follow him on Twitter @AlexKomaSNG.