CJIS Planning and Recommendations
Following the cancellation of the CJIS project with Nortel PEC, the County’s IST Department and the Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office conducted an extensive research and planning effort to determine the most viable approach to replace the current CJIS applications within the Sheriff’s Office.
The planning team consulted two national criminal justice industry groups to review the County’s business needs and to obtain advice on approaches and alternatives. The team also conducted research on CJIS best practices, potential solutions and measured the successes of other agencies who have implemented similar systems.
Although system requirements were identified prior to the previous CJIS project, this round of research and planning was implemented to ensure current needs and current technology were considered. As a result, the planned project approach is dramatically different from the previous project, and is intended to reduce the risk, cost, and implementation time for a new system.
The key project approach and strategies include:
- Use proven, commercial, off- the-shelf software that is Justice Global XML compatible, rather than developing riskier custom software. Justice Global XML has become the national standard because of its flexibility in linking data systems in a web-based format.
- Structure the project into small, manageable modules that can be implemented in phases.
- Use specialized integration software already owned by the County to provide the numerous interfaces to other local and State justice applications.
Consistent with the second bullet above, we plan to purchase and implement separate systems for pre- trial release risk assessment/case management, and arrest processing. Plans for other modules within the original CJIS project include the State’s efforts to implement a separate statewide system to replace the local magistrate and warrant systems, and CMPD providing remote data entry to the arrest processing system as a separate project.
Next steps include the following:
- County staff is evaluating Request for Proposal (RFP) responses for the pre-trial release risk assessment/case management software. We anticipate seeking Board approval to award a contract in the near future. The projected cost is $444,738 and existing Federal grant funds will be used for this project.
- A Request for Information (RFI) for the arrest processing system will be issued soon to obtain additional information on potential solutions, vendors, and cost estimates. This project is not funded at this time, so it likely will be considered for FY2009.
Mainframe Update
Last week, the Information Services & Technology Department (IST) completed outsourcing of our IBM mainframe computing services to the State of North Carolina. The volume of IBM mainframe processing has diminished substantially in recent years as most applications have migrated to the Microsoft computing environment. The only remaining Mainframe applications are the tax billing system and several criminal justice systems. Our intent is to replace all of these applications over the next two years, which will eliminate the need for mainframe computing.
Until these applications are replaced, our coordination with the State provides a cost effective means of running these applications. The outsourcing and eventual replacement will result in cost savings of more than $300,000 in FY2007 and $475,000 in FY2008.
County Manager to Serve on Board of Directors
I am pleased to announce the Sisters of Mercy of North Carolina Foundation, Inc. has selected me to serve on its Board of Directors for a three-year term.
The Sisters of Mercy of North Carolina Foundation seeks to promote systemic change and assist individuals to empower themselves, especially women, children and those who are elderly, to improve the quality of their lives.
The Foundation provides grants to tax-exempt health care, educational and social service organizations which meet its criteria and effectively assist women, children, those who are elderly and those who are poor to improve the quality of their lives. Its grant making focus is on organizations that serve the unserved or underserved.
In addition to contributing to the work of the Sisters of Mercy, serving on the Board will provide additional opportunities for relationship and partnership building in achieving the Board’s vision for our community. I look forward to serving on the Foundation’s Board of Directors and reporting to the Board about this experience.
