CASE STUDY Contra Costa County, CA PLUG & GO INTEGRATED CRIMINAL JUSTICE APPLICATIONS Dwight K Hunter President: Hunter Research, Inc. February 16, 2007 HUNTER RESEARCH, INC. 323 East Vernalis Road • Suite 309 • Tracy, CA 95304 • Telephone: 209 835-4075 • Fax: 209 835-0380 • Cell: 925 918-2607 • Email: [email protected]
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CASE STUDY
Contra Costa County, CA
PLUG & GO INTEGRATED CRIMINAL JUSTICE APPLICATIONS
Dwight K Hunter President: Hunter Research, Inc. February 16, 2007 HUNTER RESEARCH, INC. 323 East Vernalis Road • Suite 309 • Tracy, CA 95304 • Telephone: 209 835-4075 • Fax: 209 835-0380 • Cell: 925 918-2607 • Email: [email protected]
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
For over eight years there has been a concerted drive across the nation for criminal justice agencies to integrate their data systems, primarily for the purpose of maintaining data and eliminating or reducing redundancy of data entry. In spite of all the emphasis, all the conferences held, national organizations formed, grants awarded and monographs written on the subject, not to mention the millions of dollars provided of federal, state, and local funding, the amount of integration that has occurred is relatively modest. It could even be said that there was more true integration decades ago when justice components were integrated (or at least collocated) on large mainframe systems in most of the larger metropolitan statistical areas. Now, however, many of those agencies with the older systems are held captive by them because they cannot afford to, or don’t have the will to, replace them with the far more modern and productive systems that are available today. It is the author’s contention that much more progress will be made when local agencies in particular can see a clear methodology of how to proceed. Amidst all the confusing clamor and noise provided by middleware vendors and system integrators, justice agencies want to make rapid, effective progress without incurring risk to their careers or starting down a path for which they cannot see a clear outcome. It is difficult to know how to start, what platform to use, and what processes and techniques to employ, let alone find skilled persons that have the experience and can hit the front door running. The purpose of this document is to provide specific information, a case study, describing how the integration system in Contra Costa County evolved, how they organized, what technical approaches they employed, what they have accomplished to date, and what benefits they have gained. While not exactly a blueprint, there is enough technical, procedural, and political information herein that the reader should come away with a fairly clear strategy, or at least “one way” to accomplish a lot of integration in a short period of time. It is written in a straightforward, detailed, sometimes irreverent manner intended to be as honest and helpful as possible. While there is no one correct approach, the most correct are those that provide the most results in the shortest period of time, and Contra Costa County has done that. This is not a marketing document, nor a glossy one to talk about what they plan to do, but rather an example of what one county has done, how they did it, why they took the approaches they took, what worked well, and what could have been better. Initiated by the Sheriff, the criminal justice agencies in and near Contra Costa County, California have aggressively begun integrating multiple justice applications and have many in production and many more on the launch pad with 48 agencies providing valuable data and nearly 1,000 users accessing the system. We hope this case study is useful to those who are still trying to get started and to those who are currently in the process of integrating.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ......................................................................................................................................... I
DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTY ......................................................................................................................... 1
PRE-EXISTING INTEGRATED JUSTICE SYSTEMS ............................................................................................ 2
STEP 1.0: IN THE BEGINNING ............................................................................................................................ 10
STEP 2.0: GETTING ORGANIZED ........................................................................................................................ 11
STEP 3.0: FORMING A PROJECT TEAM .......................................................................................................... 15
STEP 4.0: PRELIMINARY RESEARCH AND PLANNING ............................................................................. 17
STEP 5.0: SETTING PRIORITIES ........................................................................................................................ 31
STEP 6.0: A 3-YEAR STRATEGIC INTEGRATION PLAN .............................................................................. 35
STEP 7.0: ALTERNATIVE INTEGRATION APPROACHES ........................................................................... 36
STEP 8.0: TECHNICAL APPROACH - MIDDLEWARE .................................................................................. 38
STEP 9.0: INTERFACING TO THE MAINFRAME ........................................................................................... 41
STEP 10.0: GETTING ORGANIZED FOR INTEGRATION ............................................................................. 43
SETUP ...................................................................................................................................................................... 43 CONNECTIONS .......................................................................................................................................................... 43 METHODOLOGY ....................................................................................................................................................... 43 LOCAL COORDINATORS ........................................................................................................................................... 44 SECURITY AND DIFFERENT ROLES ........................................................................................................................... 44 DESIGNING THE SYSTEM WITH MIDDLEWARE .......................................................................................................... 45 MAKING FASTER PROGRESS .................................................................................................................................... 50
PROJECT 1.0: SHARING JAIL DATA WITH ALL AGENCIES ..................................................................... 51
THE PROBLEM: ......................................................................................................................................................... 51 METHODOLOGY: ...................................................................................................................................................... 51
PROJECT 2.0: SHARING RMS DATA ................................................................................................................. 52
THE PROBLEM: ......................................................................................................................................................... 52 METHODOLOGY: ...................................................................................................................................................... 52 CHALLENGES: .......................................................................................................................................................... 53
PROJECT 3.0: SHARING MAINFRAME COURT & DA DATA...................................................................... 55
THE PROBLEM: ......................................................................................................................................................... 55 METHODOLOGY: ...................................................................................................................................................... 56
PROJECT 4.0: CONNECTING THE DOTS ......................................................................................................... 57
THE PROBLEM: ......................................................................................................................................................... 57 METHODOLOGY: ...................................................................................................................................................... 57
PROJECT 5.0: CERTIFIED ID BACKED BY PRINTS ...................................................................................... 58
THE PROBLEM: ......................................................................................................................................................... 58 METHODOLOGY: ...................................................................................................................................................... 58
PROJECT 6.0: COURT PROTECTIVE ORDERS .............................................................................................. 60
THE PROBLEM: ......................................................................................................................................................... 60 METHODOLOGY: ...................................................................................................................................................... 60
PROJECT 7.0: ADDING ALAMEDA COUNTY DATA ..................................................................................... 61
THE PROBLEM: ......................................................................................................................................................... 61 METHODOLOGY: ...................................................................................................................................................... 61
PROJECT 8.0: AUTOPILOT SEARCH & USER NOTIFICATION ................................................................. 63
THE PROBLEM: ......................................................................................................................................................... 63 METHODOLOGY: ...................................................................................................................................................... 63
PROJECT 9.0: SIX PACK LINEUPS .................................................................................................................... 64
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THE PROBLEM: ......................................................................................................................................................... 64 METHODOLOGY: ...................................................................................................................................................... 64
STEP 11.0: INSTITUTIONALIZING INTEGRATION? .................................................................................... 65
STEP 12.0: PERMANENT FUNDING? ................................................................................................................. 67
USER SURVEY ......................................................................................................................................................... 70
ARIES IMPACT ON PRODUCTIVITY ............................................................................................................................ 71 EVALUATION OF ARIES DATA SOURCES ................................................................................................................... 73
Alameda County Arrest & Booking Data .......................................................................................................... 74 CLETS/DMV Queries ........................................................................................................................................ 74 Probation Status ................................................................................................................................................. 74 California DOJ Certified ID Data ..................................................................................................................... 75 Sheriff’s Jail Data .............................................................................................................................................. 76 Mugshots from 48 Agencies .............................................................................................................................. 76 Protective Orders ................................................................................................................................................ 76 Records Management Systems .......................................................................................................................... 77 Witness & Subpoena System .............................................................................................................................. 77 Six-Pack & Large Photo Lineup System ........................................................................................................... 78 AutoPilot Repeatable Searches .......................................................................................................................... 78
LIFE WITHOUT ARIES? ......................................................................................................................................... 79
OVERALL IMPACT OF ARIES ..................................................................................................................................... 79 ARIES USER COMMENTS .......................................................................................................................................... 81 CONCLUSION: ........................................................................................................................................................... 82
A MAP OF THE ARIES WEB APPLICATION .................................................................................................... 83
SUMMARY AND LESSONS LEARNED ............................................................................................................... 84
1
DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTY Contra Costa County is an urban/suburban county with a population of over 1.0 million. It is located in pockets of dense municipal populations with wide open spaces in between. Primarily, the municipal police handle law enforcement in the populated centers, and the Sheriff’s office protects the unincorporated area in between and provides contract services to six smaller municipalities. .
Figure 1.0: Contra Costa County’s Location in the San Francisco Bay Area
The populations of Contra Costa County and the surrounding counties are as follows:
Alameda County - 1,496,200 Contra Costa County - 994,900 Marin County - 250,400 Napa County - 129,800 San Francisco City & County - 791,600 San Mateo County - 717,000 San Joaquin County - 513,500 Santa Clara County - 1,729,900 Solano County - 412,000 Total: 7,035,300
Shown below in Figure 2.0 is a map of Contra Costa County in more detail.
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Figure 2.0: Map of Contra Costa County
PRE-EXISTING INTEGRATED JUSTICE SYSTEMS
The agencies within the Contra Costa County justice community employ many systems to assist them in their respective missions. They have undertaken a significant amount of integration and sharing of data over the past several decades. The following are some examples of the current integrated systems in use in Contra Costa County.
The Law and Justice Information System (LJIS) is an integrated system on the mainframe which provides services to the District Attorney, the Public Defender, the Superior Court, and Probation. It contains the following modules:
1. Traffic Cases 2. District Attorney – Adult 3. District Attorney – Juvenile 4. Juvenile Court 5. Municipal Court 6. Superior Court 7. Wants and Warrants 8. Bail 9. Probation – Adult 10. Probation – Juvenile
The All County Criminal Justice Information Network (ACCJIN), in operation since 1990, is a secure wide area network and is the gateway by which county agencies and all municipal police agencies gain access to the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System
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(CLETS) and the federal NCIC systems. The Sheriff’s Office provides contract services (including information system support) to the following cities:
1. Danville 2. Lafayette 3. Orinda 4. San Ramon 5. Oakley 6. Pittsburg (RMS and CAD services only) 7. Moraga (CAD only)
The City of Richmond provides Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) and Records Management System (RMS) for the following cities.
1. El Cerrito 2. Hercules 3. Kensington 4. Pinole 5. San Pablo
The City of Concord provides CAD and RMS for the city of Clayton as well. Table 1.0 below identifies all the systems that are known to be operating in the county justice community.
Table 1.0: Criminal Justice Systems Utilized in Contra Costa County
Information System Name Vendor Database
New World Aegis CAD / RMS / FI Aegis New World SQl Server
California Law Enforcement Telecommunications CLETS State
Computerized Arrest & Booking System Offender CABS Visiphor BIE Oracle 8i
Convicted Offender DNA Database Index System CODIS FBI
Coroner's Report Sheriff Access
Data911 CAD Data 911 Oracle
Data911 RMS Data 911 Oracle
Department of Motor Vehicles DMV State
Domestic Violence Reporting System DVRS Tiburon Proprietary
1
Evidence TraQ – (Crime Lab) Qtel Visual Foxpro
EZDoc – (Crime Lab) Mideo
Fingerprint System Livescan Identix
High Intensity Drug Traffic Area HIDTA Federal DNA
Image Management System IMS Disc Image. Gupta SQL
Integrated Ballistics Information System (Crime Lab) IBIS Federal
Jail Management System JMS CorrLogic Oracle
Justice Automated Warrant System JAWS DOIT
Lab Information Management System-Plus LIMS-Plus Justice Trax SQL Server
LJIS (Integrated justice mainframe system) LJIS County IDMS
Parole Leads LEADS State DOC
PictureLink (Mugshot system) Dynamic Imaging Access
PRC Computer-Aided Dispatch2 CAD DNA DNA
Revenue Plus Collector System RPCS CUBS Jbase
Target S.O. Records Archive
Tiburon Computer-Aided Dispatch CAD Tiburon Proprietary
Tiburon Records Management System RMS Tiburon Proprietary
TRAK TRAK State
Versaterm Versaterm Sybase
Violent Criminal Apprehension Program VICAP Federal
Western States Intelligence Network WSIN State
Table 2.0 below shows the population of the municipalities in the county and the number of employees where known. Since county services generally extend to the whole county it would be redundant to repeatedly enter the county population. In some cases the number of law enforcement employees of the college districts and other entities has not yet been determined.
1 Has an export function that can be read into Oracle or other databases
2 The City of Richmond is replacing this with New World within the next six months.
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Table 2.0: Criminal Justice Agencies
DEPARTMENT OR AGENCY EMPLOYEES 2003 POP.
Sheriff 1,126 139,100
Sheriff Danville PD 43,200
Sheriff Lafayette PD 24,400
Sheriff Oakley PD 27,000
Sheriff Orinda PD 17,850
Sheriff San Ramon PD 47,050
California Highway Patrol Unknown DNA
County Mainframe Courts 410 994,900
County Mainframe Public Defender 122 994,900
County Mainframe Social Services 994,900
County Mainframe District Attorney 197 994,900
County Mainframe Probation 457 994,900
Antioch PD 151 99,300
Brentwood PD 57 33,000
Clayton PD 14 11,000
Concord PD 220 124,900
CC Community College PD 30 DNA
East Bay Regional Park Police Unknown DNA
Hercules PD 23 20,500
Martinez PD 55 36,900
Moraga PD 14 16,500
Office of Revenue Collection No Estimate
Pinole PD 40 19,500
Pittsburg PD 98 61,100
Pleasant Hill PD 68 33,700
Richmond PD 275 101,400
El Cerrito PD 43 23,550
Kensington PD 11 No Estimate
San Pablo PD 59 30,750
Walnut Creek PD 113 66,000
West County Schools Police Unknown No Estimate
Total: 3582 994,900
Table 3.0 below indicates which agencies use the various criminal justice and related systems. This illustrates how widely dispersed the data is and how valuable it would be for a variety of reasons to be able to at least browse across some of the data, if not reduce duplication of data entry in the future by “pushing” and “pulling” data from one system to another.
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10
STEP 1.0: IN THE BEGINNING
In 1998 the Sheriff’s Office began exploring ways to address integration. Inquiries were made of other jurisdictions where efforts were underway to (a) identify duplication of data entry, and (b) to share information among appropriate agencies. A visit was made to Sacramento County’s Integration Project to compare notes and see what activities they were pursuing. The three managers from the Sheriff’s Office Technical Services Unit were impressed with some of the analytical work product that Sacramento had produced. They had isolated all the kinds of information that is generated in criminal justice as well as the major functions that are performed, such as investigation, adjudication, supervision, etc. Further they had produced a giant wall chart with Create, Read, Update, or Delete (CRUD) designations by the agencies that manage or use the specific data. They had also generated a CRUD diagram on how they wished the justice system data would be configured.
The Technical Services management contacted Search, The National Consortium for Justice Information and Statistics21 and invited them to perform a summary analysis of the County’s circumstances which culminated in a 12/2001 report by them entitled, “Contra Costa County, California – Planning for Integrated Justice Information Systems: Observations and Recommendations. The lead principals from Search only interviewed two people from the Sheriff’s office and came to the conclusion that integration of justice data might be possible. While the service was free, it did not provide much vision, direction, or assistance.
The Integrated Justice Information System Committee invited their counterpart committee from Sacramento County to come and explain their approach, the challenges they faced, and recommendations they might make. In an unselfish and cooperative spirit, five principals from the Sacramento County Justice Community made the trip and provided a lot of information and encouragement to the Contra Costa County group.
Lieutenant Ingersoll from the Sheriff’s Office dedicated himself to finding any information he could find on what other jurisdictions had done, particularly looking for plans and papers that would provide insights. These documents were copied and distributed widely to members of the local committee.
The leadership role of the Sheriff in this effort cannot be emphasized enough because it is the key to the beginning and the successful launch of the system. He put up the money and charged his management and support staff to cooperate in every respect. He emphasized to the other law enforcement agencies that they were all in this together. He also emphasized over and over to the Courts, Prosecutor, Public Defender and Probation Departments that the project included all of criminal justice, not just law enforcement. At one point when the court complained that they couldn’t come up with their $10,000 share to keep the project going between federal grants, he cajoled them and offered to pay their share to ensure that they were in the game. They relented and found the funds.
21
SEARCH is a nonprofit membership organization created by and for the states that is dedicated to improving the criminal justice system through the effective application of information and identification technology. www.search.org/integration/default.asp.
11
STEP 2.0: GETTING ORGANIZED
Spearheaded by the Sheriff’s Office, the justice department heads began to urge the county to organize user groups and were anxious to get underway. The groups formed are as follows: 1. Justice Automation Advisory Committee (Policy Group) The Justice Automation Advisory Committee was formed from department heads of the justice agencies, police chiefs of several municipalities, the Court, the District Attorney, the Public Defender, Probation, Employment and Health Services, Revenue Collection, Parks District, Bay Area Rapid Transit, California Highway Patrol, and law enforcement from various college districts.
They began to meet under the auspices of the County Administrator’s office to address policy issues with regard to helping make criminal justice information systems more effective and efficient. They meet once a quarter.
2. Integrated Justice Information Systems Project Committee (Operational Group and IT Representatives In 2002, a second committee, composed of operational managers of the above agencies, was formed and meets monthly to develop specific initiatives to address duplication and sharing of information. This project was called the Contra Costa County Justice Information Systems Project. The committee selected a name for the integrated justice system they wished to build, which is:
“AUTOMATED REGIONAL INFORMATION EXCHANGE SYSTEM (ARIES)”
The committee used foresight in not naming the system after the county because of their proximity to Oakland and Alameda County with whom they have had conversations regarding sharing of data across county lines, and they assumed that one day it could grow into a regionally shared system. Thereafter the committed changed its name to the ARIES Committee.
Mission
The mission statement of the ARIES Committee is as follows:
“To develop and implement a dynamic information sharing system for criminal justice agencies”
Scope
The Scope of the Contra Costa County Integrated Justice Information Systems Project is the timely integration of justice information systems with an emphasis on sharing accurate, complete and needed information. Participation from a variety of traditionally non-justice agencies in this project, such as Employment and Human Services, Health Services, and the Office of Revenue Collection, will ensure that related criminal justice information is shared between departments on a legal and need-to-know basis. The focus will be on the critical relationships and linkages between these departments and the justice agencies, not on their internal business and informational processes.
12
Project Goals
1. Provide more comprehensive access to information regarding individual cases, people, events, and justice system processing.
2. Improve the timeliness, accuracy, completeness, and overall quality of information by providing a single point of data entry and the ability to share information among agencies and the Court that is based on a legal and need-to-know basis.
3. Improve operational effectiveness and reduce costs by evaluation of workflow and processes by suggesting the re-engineering or sharing of data as needed.
4. Increase information exchange and analysis among departments, agencies, and the Court.
5. Provide users with the tools and system capabilities necessary to make individual case decisions and to conduct analysis, research, and ad hoc reporting.
Critical Success Factors
1. Current functionality or the ability to make system modifications to meet on-going operational needs will be retained.
2. Increase exchange of information wherever possible.
3. Confidentiality will be consistent with legal restrictions.
4. Systems, applications, tools, and other methodologies will be created for authorized users to access and share complete, accurate, and timely information about individuals, addresses, and events for authorized criminal and non-criminal justice purposes.
5. Administration of justice and public policy decisions will be made in a cost-effective manner.
6. Provide agencies a voice in the operation of the system.
7. Participation from as many agencies and departments as would like to be involved.
NOTE: Hunter Research, Inc. was involved in these early formative steps and saw provincialism and resistance to cooperation and sharing melt away because of two factors. The first was the 9/11 catastrophe which alarmed all agencies of the need to work together for mutual protection and enforcement. The second was the assurance from the Sheriff that individual agencies could decide to participate or not and could determine their level of participation. Further, they would have veto power over any data from their agencies that they did not want to share.
13
Figure 3.0: Organizational Chart for the ARIES Integration Project
CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY
DISTRICT
ATTORNEY
CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY OFFICE
OF THE
SHERIFF
CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY BOARD
OF
SUPERVISORS
SUPERIOR COURT
OF CALIFORNIA
COUNTY OF
CONTRA COSTA
MUNICIPAL
CITY
COUNCILS
CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY
ADMINISTRATIVE
OFFICER
MUNICIPAL
CHIEFS
OF
POLICE
MUNICIPAL
CITY
ADMINISTRATORS
MUNICIPAL
POLICE
TECHNICAL/
OPERATIONS
REPS
CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY
PROBATION
DEPARTMENT
CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY PUBLIC
DEFENDER
CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY
EMPLOYMENT &
HUMAN SERVICES
(WELFARE FRAUD)
(1)
JUSTICE
AUTOMATION
ADVISORY
GROUP (JAAC)
(4) CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY
ASSOCIATION
OF
CHIEFS OF POLICE
(5)
CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY COP-TAC
COMMITTEE
(2)
AUTOMATED REGIONAL
INFORMATION
EXCHANGE SYSTEM
COMMITTEE (ARIES)
(7)
SECURITY
COMMITTEECONTRA COSTA
COUNTY OFFICE OF
REVENUE
RECOVERY
CONTRA
COSTA
COUNTY LAW
& JUSTICE
SYSTEMS
(3) CONTRA COSTA
COUNTY DEPT. OF
INFORMATION
TECHNOLOGY
(8)
TEMPORARY
WORKING
GROUPS
EAST BAY
REGIONAL
PARK
CHP
COMMUNITY
COLLEGE
POLICE
BAY AREA
RAPID
TRANSIT
POLICE
(9) OTHER COUNTIES, MUNICIPALITES & AGENCIES
(6)
FINANCE
COMMITTEE
(1) The JAAC Committee is composed of the department heads for county justice
agencies representations from three municipal police departments who represent the 25 municipal law enforcement agencies in the county. They meet once a quarter.
(2) The ARIES Committee is the workhorse group that meets every month and approves
the strategic plan, budgets, project plans and makes recommendations to the JAAC Committee. The development team (not shown) develops prototypes and demo systems monthly and obtains approval for various technical issues that are raised.
(3) The County DoIT is the county IT department and primarily attends to the IBM OS390
mainframe and other mini-computers in the system. Like most County IT shops, their major skills surround the care and feeding of the mainframe. The staff is skewed toward the more senior levels in terms of seniority. As a rule, they are not developers but mostly provide maintenance and LAN/WAN services. In general, unlike the author’s experience in other counties, particularly San Francisco, this department has a “can do” attitude and has been very cooperative.
14
(4) The Association of Chiefs of Police meets every two months to consider issues of mutual interest. The ARIES law enforcement representatives use this group as an unofficial but critical sounding board and an informal approval entity, not wanting to do or omit any initiative that would be displeasing to them. In addition, this is another method of gaining good communication and cooperation among the many law enforcement agencies.
(5) The CopTac Committee is composed of the more technical and operational mid-
managers among the law enforcement agencies. They have many members in common with the ARIES committee and meet every other month immediately following the ARIES meeting.
(6) The Finance Committee meets regularly to find methods of funding ARIES after the
federal funds are no longer available. They look at annual dues, fines, and fees, hotel taxes, county portals and other non-general fund methods to support the system. After thousands of users are dependent upon the system, it could be disastrous to have to shut it down.
(7) The Security Committee is a standing committee that reviews security issues on
almost a monthly basis. They look at user roles and what specific data elements each role should be able to see or not and then make recommendations to the ARIES committee.
(8) The Temporary Working Groups are subject matter experts from various agencies
needed to advise and shape specific applications. For instance, investigators from the various departments are pulled together from time to time to (a) review needs and requirements for an application, (b) see prototypes of demos of early applications, and to (c) be beta testers of the early application. Other committees are family court judges for protective order applications, subpoena clerks for the witness “call off” system, crime analysts, etc.
(9) The Regionalization Committee – Because other counties and state agencies have
requested participation in ARIES, a subcommittee has been formed to address (a) how to enable telecommunication and sharing, (b) how to monitor security and user management of a regional system, (c) how to fund the added scaling, and (d) how to share costs among the providers and users of regionally-shared data.
15
STEP 3.0: FORMING A PROJECT TEAM
Funding a Project Team
In September 2002, Kenda, Inc. (a staff augmentation firm) was contracted to provide a project manager and two Senior Consultants to provide assistance to the committees in beginning their steps toward effective integration and sharing of criminal justice data. Kenda was selected by Contra Costa County because the Sheriff’s staff had visited the integration project in Sacramento which Kenda staffed and was impressed with some of their work products, particularly their analysis of data and documents the various agencies criminal justice agencies could share.
Hunter Research, Inc. was subcontracted by Kenda to provide the project management and staffing for Contra Costa County. Funding of $338,800 was provided solely by the Sheriff’s Office, whose representatives made it a point to emphasize that the effort was not just for the Sheriff’s Office, nor was it to be entirely law enforcement oriented. The scope was all of criminal justice and related components. The tasks for the six-month effort were as follows:
Table 4.0: Phase I Tasks and Accomplishments
Task Description Accomplishments
1.0 Organize Project Established a work plan, set up an office, bought computers, gathered names, addresses etc.
2.0 Document Hardware, Software, Functions, and Data
Interviewed over one hundred agency staff and documented the systems they currently use and the data elements available within their systems. Created a master database of all data elements by system and agency.
3.0 Document Department Workflows and Business Processes
Documented most step-by-step procedures undertaken within the agencies and identified linkages of data exchanges between agencies.
4.0 Gather Departmental Sharing, Needs, and Requirements
Created a catalog of approximate sixty (60) detailed mini-projects that identified:
1. Specific sharing problems, 2. Agencies impacted, 3. Computer systems involved, 4. Proposed technical strategy, 5. Proposed implementation steps 6. Estimated labor budget 7. Criteria for prioritizing projects
5.0 Analyze Data Sharing Performed analysis of the data modules in the LJIS system as well as the Records Management Systems, the Crime Lab Systems, etc., and created strategies on how best to share data among authorized agencies.
6.0 Develop a Prototype of Information Sharing
Created a system to read the 350,000 live records in the Jail Management System and to link the records with mug shots where available. (Added by HRI.)
16
While the initial contract did not require the development of any systems, HRI was able to talk the committee into letting them get some infrastructure in place so they could begin sharing data, rather than just creating more reports and documents. HRI had previous experience in developing integrated systems for the City and County of San Francisco and wanted to accelerate the progress by building the first system for sharing data. Accordingly, task 6.0 above was added.
17
STEP 4.0: PRELIMINARY RESEARCH AND PLANNING The committee and project team needed to put all the requirements and sharing projects into a plan so that they could budget, seek grant funds, and convince their respective county and city administrators of the worthiness of their cause. Mapping the County Criminal Justice System The project team and committee members developed a general workflow for the criminal justices system (Adult only) as it functions within the County. All major documents that flow from, or are generated in, each major function were overlaid on top of the work flow graphic. Next, the team overlaid all of the sharing projects on the workflow to show which agencies would benefit and where in the process the sharing or integration project would impact. (See Figure 5.0 below.) The number of projects clustering around the investigation function is intriguing which illustrates the many places that investigative agencies have their data, but which also shows how difficult it is to “connect the dots” when the data is highly distributed. Most of the highest priorities of the sharing projects are clustered around this area. Using the SEARCH JIEM Modeling Tool The ARIES Committee requested a training session for key members from different departments along with the project team to go through the SEARCH Justice Information Exchange Model. The JIEM Modeling Tool is a software package by Search22 created to help users map their local criminal justice system. The JIEM Modeling Tool is a web-based application, developed with the Java programming language and a Sybase relational database. It operates on a server housed at SEARCH headquarters in Sacramento, CA and is available to all authorized users over the Internet. ARIES committee members are engaged at this time in completing the JIEM templates.
A National Survey
HRI completed a survey of other county integration efforts across the country. We could only find 40 counties who were thinking about integration, actively involved in integration, or totally integrated (if you are ever really finished). We wanted to know the following:
1. What is your governance structure? 2. How are you funded? 3. What is your staffing level? 4. On a continuum from thinking about it to implementing integrated systems where do you fall? 5. Which components (Law Enforcement, DA, Public Defender, etc.) are you integrating? 6. Which subcomponents (CAD, RMS, Warrants, etc.,) are you actually integrating? 7. What have been your biggest challenges? 8. Etc.23
The largest challenges reported by the agencies that returned the surveys (21 of the 40 agencies returned the survey) were surprising. The multiple choice answers to the challenges question were the following:
1. Lack of funding
22
An organization funded by the U.S. Department of Justice to assist improvement of justice programs and practices 23
The results of this survey are shown below in Table 5.0.
18
2. Obtaining agreement among the agencies on priorities 3. Determining our needs 4. Deciding which technology to use 5. Finding skilled help with the newer skills 6. Strong leadership 7. Maintaining momentum 8. Making rapid progress 9. Cleaning our data
We expected everyone to gravitate to the easy choice of lack of funding, and half of the respondents did identify that as a challenge, but the majority of the factors selected were items 6-8 above, which are all related. If a project is not making rapid progress, then it is difficult to maintain interest and funding support over the long haul. How does one maintain momentum? We believe it can come from several places, with the first being leadership. A strong leader creates belief in the mind of the troops that the mission is very important and can be achieved. Even when it is difficult and there are many obstacles to face, the team members keep striving because they believe in the mission and believe that the leader wants success. As was mentioned earlier, that leadership was provided by the Sheriff of Contra Costa County who is celebrating his 40th year in law enforcement with the county. His commanders, captains and lieutenants as well as non-commissioned support staff were not sure how it would come out, but they were committed to making it work. That commitment bled over to the other justice agency and municipal law enforcement agencies as well. The second momentum builder is constant success. At the conclusion of each meeting of the ARIES Committee, the project team goes to the marker board and decides what great things they will demonstrate to the committee in the next monthly meeting. When the committee sees new applications and bells and whistles on a continuing basis, they know that progress is being made. When new applications are consistently being put into production, the excitement and anticipation build each month for the development team as well as for the committee. One can make rapid progress by using rapid development tools and by working very fast and very hard, while at the same time not skimping on testing and quality assurance. One can also pick shorter range, achievable targets. The first project we selected was to share the jail data, because it was one database that everyone needs. Doing that quickly so that the whole community could benefit quickly was a credibility building factor. In another county, the developers focused on a rather difficult first project of unifying the case number from police incident report, through the prosecutor, public defender, court and probation. While many counties would lust for that, it is very challenging in trying to restructure the case management systems and the naming conventions of old cases versus new cases, and often the case management software case number formats are limited. We worked on long term projects, but in the meantime kept successfully implementing the short term ones.
19
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are
22
CO
UN
TY
Co
ntr
a
Co
sta
M
c
Hen
ry
Mech
- le
nb
urg
M
ari
- C
op
a
W
DC
E
u
Cla
ire
Mc
Cle
an
Ven
tura
S
part
an
- b
urg
F
ou
r C
ou
nty
24
Dad
e
Co
un
ty
David
- so
n
Palm
B
each
Kern
Ora
ng
e
San
Jo
aq
uin
Hen
ry
ST
AT
E
CA
IL
N
C
AZ
W
DC
W
I IL
C
A
SC
N
V
FL
T
N
FL
C
A
FL
C
A
GA
2000 P
OP
UL
AT
ION
950K
260K
695K
3.0
M
572K
93K
150K
753K
254K
114K
2.2
M
570K
896K
703K
896K
614K
119K
L
ack
of C
oopera
tion –
Som
e A
gencie
s
g
L
ack
of IT
Support
fro
m C
ounty
M
ain
tain
ing M
om
entu
m &
Inte
rest
g
g
g
g
M
aki
ng R
apid
Pro
gre
ss
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
K
eepin
g o
ur
Data
Cle
an
g
g
K
eepin
g Inte
gra
tion w
ith C
ourt
g
g
7.
Yo
ur
Exis
tin
g o
r P
lan
ned
Sys
tem
M
ain
fram
e L
egacy
Sys
tem
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
E
xtra
ct
data
fro
m M
ain
fram
e
g
P
g
g
R
epla
ce the M
ain
fram
e S
yste
m
g
P
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
B
uild
New
Sys
tem
fro
m S
cra
tch
g
P
g
g
g
g
B
row
se E
xisting S
yste
ms
g
g
g
P
ush d
ata
fro
m S
yste
m 2
Sys
tem
P
27
P
g
g
g
g
g
C
ross-L
icense E
ach O
thers
Sys
tem
g
8. W
hat
Ap
pli
cati
on
s a
re In
teg
rate
d
C
AD
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
F
ield
Inte
rvie
ws
P
g
P
g
P
g
g
g
g
Inci
dent
Report
Writing
P
P
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
R
ecord
s M
anagem
ent
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
M
ug s
hots
g
P
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
F
ingerp
rints
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
g
C
rim
e L
ab R
eport
s g
P
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
S
tole
n V
ehic
le R
eport
s P
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
ropert
y/E
vidence R
oom
P
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
P
g
g
C
oro
ner's
Report
s P
P
g
g
g
g
P
aw
n T
ickets
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
C
rim
inal H
isto
ry W
ithout D
ispositi
ons
g
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
P
g
?
g
C
rim
inal H
isto
ry W
ith D
ispositi
ons
P
g
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
P
g
?
g
27 P
me
an
s th
ey
are
pla
nn
ing
this
fe
atu
re, th
e g
me
ans t
he
y a
lre
ad
y h
ave
it.
23
CO
UN
TY
Co
ntr
a
Co
sta
M
c
Hen
ry
Mech
- le
nb
urg
M
ari
- C
op
a
W
DC
E
u
Cla
ire
Mc
Cle
an
Ven
tura
S
part
an
- b
urg
F
ou
r C
ou
nty
24
Dad
e
Co
un
ty
David
- so
n
Palm
B
each
Kern
Ora
ng
e
San
Jo
aq
uin
Hen
ry
ST
AT
E
CA
IL
N
C
AZ
W
DC
W
I IL
C
A
SC
N
V
FL
T
N
FL
C
A
FL
C
A
GA
2000 P
OP
UL
AT
ION
950K
260K
695K
3.0
M
572K
93K
150K
753K
254K
114K
2.2
M
570K
896K
703K
896K
614K
119K
S
ex
Regis
try
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
g
g
J
ail
Bookin
g
g
P
P
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
P
g
g
g
J
ail
Inm
ate
Managem
ent D
ata
g
P
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
P
g
g
g
D
A C
om
pla
ints
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
?
g
D
A W
arr
ants
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
g
g
D
A S
ubpoenas
g
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
g
g
D
A D
isposi
tions
P
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
?
g
D
A P
leas
and M
otions
g
g
g
P
P
?
g
D
A C
ase A
ssig
nm
ents
P
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
g
D
efe
nse C
ase A
ssig
nm
ents
P
P
P
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
D
efe
nse P
leas a
nd M
otio
ns
P
g
g
g
g
P
C
ourt
Cale
ndars
P
g
P
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
g
g
g
C
ourt
Bench W
arr
ants
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
P
g
g
C
ourt
Min
ute
Ord
ers
P
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
P
g
g
C
ourt
Dis
positi
ons
P
g
P
P
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
P
g
g
C
ourt
Sente
nces
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
g
P
g
g
C
hild
Pro
tect
ive O
rders
g
g
g
g
g
P
P
g
R
estr
ain
ing O
rders
P
g
g
g
g
g
P
g
P
g
g
P
robation P
re-S
ente
nce R
eport
s
P
g
g
P
g
g
P
robation S
peci
al R
eport
s
P
g
g
P
g
g
P
robation W
arr
ants
g
P
g
g
P
g
g
g
g
P
robation S
tatu
s
P
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
robation T
erm
s &
Conditi
ons
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
robation O
ffic
er's
Nam
e
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
robation C
om
plia
nce
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
H
ealth
Serv
ices
P
g
g
g
g
W
elfare
Fra
ud
P
P
g
g
g
R
eve
nue R
ecove
ry
P
g
g
g
g
9.
Ho
w D
o Y
ou
Sh
are
Data
No
w?
E
very
User
has a
Term
inal
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
24
CO
UN
TY
Co
ntr
a
Co
sta
M
c
Hen
ry
Mech
- le
nb
urg
M
ari
- C
op
a
W
DC
E
u
Cla
ire
Mc
Cle
an
Ven
tura
S
part
an
- b
urg
F
ou
r C
ou
nty
24
Dad
e
Co
un
ty
David
- so
n
Palm
B
each
Kern
Ora
ng
e
San
Jo
aq
uin
Hen
ry
ST
AT
E
CA
IL
N
C
AZ
W
DC
W
I IL
C
A
SC
N
V
FL
T
N
FL
C
A
FL
C
A
GA
2000 P
OP
UL
AT
ION
950K
260K
695K
3.0
M
572K
93K
150K
753K
254K
114K
2.2
M
570K
896K
703K
896K
614K
119K
C
ross-L
icense o
ne u
ser
in D
ept.
g
g
N
ightly
Ext
racts
of D
ata
to R
DM
S
g
g
g
g
g
g
M
iddle
ware
that
reads
data
P
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
D
ata
Sto
re o
r D
ata
Ware
house D
um
p
g
g
g
g
g
O
ther
g
g
g
g
10.
Hard
ware
Pla
tfo
rms
M
ain
fram
e L
egacy
Sys
tem
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
C
lient S
erv
er
LA
N o
r W
AN
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
W
eb B
ased A
pplic
ations
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
T
imeshare
11.
Yo
ur
Serv
er
Co
nfi
gu
rati
on
M
ain
fram
e L
egacy
Sys
tem
O
S390
Reflectio
ns
OS
390
OS
390
IB
M
OS
400
L
AN
/WA
N S
erv
ers
W
inte
l N
ove
ll/W
in
Unix
/Win
H
PU
X:A
IX
Win
2000
A
IX
UN
IX
Str
atu
s/W
inS
un/U
NIX
g
Sola
ris
Win
2000
Win
200
0
12.
Data
bases Y
ou
are
Usin
g
M
ain
fram
e L
egacy
Sys
tem
ID
MS
D
B2
?
IDM
S
Data
Com
U
nix
R
PG
L
AN
/WA
N S
yste
m
SQ
L
Serv
er
Btr
ieve
O
racle
/SQ
L
DB
2
SQ
L
Serv
er
?
Ora
cl
e
Syb
ase
SQ
L 2
000
Ora
cle
Ora
cle
Ora
cle
S
QL
Serv
er
In
tel
SQ
L
13.
To
ols
, U
tili
ties, M
idd
lew
are
C
ase T
ools
g
g
C
ryst
al E
nte
rprise
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
A
ltioLiv
e 3
.0
A
ttunity
B
EA
Sys
tem
s W
eblo
gic
B
riya
nte
Justic
e Inte
gatio
n
g
g
C
ognos P
ow
erp
lay
C
om
pute
r A
ssocia
tes
g
g
C
url C
orp
ora
tion
D
igital H
arb
or
PiiE
E
xadas
g
F
iora
no T
ifosi
2002
25
CO
UN
TY
Co
ntr
a
Co
sta
M
c
Hen
ry
Mech
- le
nb
urg
M
ari
- C
op
a
W
DC
E
u
Cla
ire
Mc
Cle
an
Ven
tura
S
part
an
- b
urg
F
ou
r C
ou
nty
24
Dad
e
Co
un
ty
David
- so
n
Palm
B
each
Kern
Ora
ng
e
San
Jo
aq
uin
Hen
ry
ST
AT
E
CA
IL
N
C
AZ
W
DC
W
I IL
C
A
SC
N
V
FL
T
N
FL
C
A
FL
C
A
GA
2000 P
OP
UL
AT
ION
950K
260K
695K
3.0
M
572K
93K
150K
753K
254K
114K
2.2
M
570K
896K
703K
896K
614K
119K
F
ourb
it G
roup F
able
t
G
rand C
entr
al C
om
munic
ations
IB
M M
Q S
eries
g
IB
M W
ebsphere
g
IB
M W
SE
D 5
.0
IO
NA
IW
AY
g
J
acada I
nte
face S
erv
er
M
7 A
pplic
ation A
ssem
bly
Suite 3
.0
M
icro
soft B
izta
lk S
erv
er
g
g
O
penlin
k S
oft
ware
O
racle
g
g
g
g
g
g
S
AP
Netw
eave
r
S
onic
ES
B 5
.0
S
ybase R
ep S
erv
er/
Direct
Connect
g
S
yperlin
k H
arv
este
r
S
ystinet W
AS
P
W
ebsm
art
by
BC
D
14.
Yo
ur
Po
lic
y C
om
mit
tee
L
aw
Enfo
rcem
ent
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
D
istr
ict A
ttorn
eys
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
ublic
Defe
nders
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
C
ourt
s g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
P
robation
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
S
tate
Polic
e
g
g
g
S
tate
Corr
ect
ions
g
H
ealth
Serv
ices
g
g
E
ducational I
nst
itutions
g
g
M
ass
Tra
nsit
O
ther
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
26
CO
UN
TY
Co
ntr
a
Co
sta
M
c
Hen
ry
Mech
- le
nb
urg
M
ari
- C
op
a
W
DC
E
u
Cla
ire
Mc
Cle
an
Ven
tura
S
part
an
- b
urg
F
ou
r C
ou
nty
24
Dad
e
Co
un
ty
David
- so
n
Palm
B
each
Kern
Ora
ng
e
San
Jo
aq
uin
Hen
ry
ST
AT
E
CA
IL
N
C
AZ
W
DC
W
I IL
C
A
SC
N
V
FL
T
N
FL
C
A
FL
C
A
GA
2000 P
OP
UL
AT
ION
950K
260K
695K
3.0
M
572K
93K
150K
753K
254K
114K
2.2
M
570K
896K
703K
896K
614K
119K
15.
Vo
tin
g S
tru
ctu
re –
Po
lic
y C
om
mit
tee
O
ne P
ers
on -
One V
ote
g
g
g
g
g
O
ne A
gency
- O
ne V
ote
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
W
eig
hte
d b
y P
opula
tion
O
ther
Chie
f V
eto
Consens
us
Consensu
s
16.
Opera
tional C
om
mitt
ee (
Y/N
) Y
es
Yes
N
N
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
N
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
N
17.
Technic
al C
om
mitt
ee (
Y/N
) N
Y
es
Yes
Yes
Y
es
N
N
N
N
Yes
N
N
Yes
N
Yes
Yes
N
18.
Security
Com
mitt
ee (
Y/N
) Y
es
N
N
Yes
Yes
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
Yes
N
N
N
N
19.
So
urc
e o
f F
inan
cin
g
F
edera
l
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
S
tate
g
g
g
g
g
L
ocal
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
F
oundation
P
riva
te
B
orr
ow
ing
g
20.
Lo
cal
Co
st
Sh
ari
ng
Meth
od
U
ser
Fees b
ased o
n T
ransactions
g
g
T
BD
28
A
llocation b
y P
opula
tion
g
A
llocation b
y N
um
ber
of S
taff
L
um
p S
um
Allo
catio
n b
y C
ounty
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
g
O
ther
None
Centr
al
Fund
None
Citie
s
Per
User
?
Not
Sure
C
entr
al+
A
gencie
s
21 W
hat
is Y
our
Annual B
udget
689K
N
one
3.7
5 M
7.0
M
1.4
M
?
Varies
Varies
?
?
?
2.7
M
1.5
M
8.0
29
TB
D
250-
500K
22.
Siz
e o
f Y
our
Sta
ff in
FT
Es
2
None
13.0
18.0
2.0
3.0
2
12
2
6
18
10
8
Cont3
0
0
0
28 T
o b
e d
ete
rmin
ed
29 O
ver
Mu
lti-
yea
r e
ffo
rt
30 U
sin
g c
on
tracto
rs n
ow
– L
oo
kin
g a
t o
ng
oin
g s
taff
re
quir
em
en
ts
27
A Catalog of Possible Data Sharing Projects
This phase was completed in March 2003 with the publication of a Catalog of Possible Data Sharing Projects31 of 40+ distinct integration or sharing projects identified and prioritized by the committee plus a working prototype of the first project, the jail data sharing system, as the first application of ARIES. All 40+ projects were fleshed out in mini-strategies, (See a sample of a mini-strategy in Table 6.0 below), showing the following:
1. What problem the lack of integration was causing
2. What agencies and data systems were involved
3. What were the possible solutions
4. What technical approach would be taken
5. What are the specific steps and tasks to be undertaken
6. What is a reasonable schedule
7. What budget (and sources of revenue) will be required
Figure 6.0: Catalog of Potential Data Sharing Projects
CATALOG OF
POSSIBLE
DATA SHARING
PROJECTS
CONTRA COSTA COUNTY
INTEGRATED JUSTICE
INFORMATION SYSTEMS
PROJECT
Martinez, CA 94553
(925) 313-2425
TABLE OF CONTENTS
SUMMARY OF CANDIDATE PROJECTS
INTRODUCTION
GROUP 1.0 - IDENTIFYING PERSONS OF INTEREST
GROUP 2.0 - LOCATING PERSONS OF INTEREST
GROUP 3.0 - DETERMINING THE STATUS OF A CASE
GROUP 4.0 - MANAGING EVIDENCE AND PROPERTY
GROUP 5.0 - INCREASING EFFICIENCY
GROUP 6.0 - MAINTAINING EXISTING INTEGRATION
GROUP 7.0 - RESEARCH & EVALUATION & PLANNING
Much of the integration literature might quarrel with many of the projects being classified as integration when they don’t involve physically pushing data from System A to System B, but most of these projects involve exposing data that one agency enters and updates to all the other justice entities that need the information. They may not need it transplanted into their systems, but just need to be able to read it. For instance, the Public Defender needs to know if his client is in jail this very nanosecond. If he can query the “real time” jail data at will, then his need is satisfied. He does not need to have the jail status “pulled” from the jail system and “pushed” into his own information system. Table 7.0 below shows different types of integration.
31
Hunter, Dwight, Catalog of Possible Data Sharing Projects, revised March 2005.
28
Table 6.0: Example of a Mini-Strategy for All Integration Projects
5. County-Wide Stolen Vehicle Database Code: 005
A. Problem Description Timing is critical in attempting to re-capture stolen vehicles and apprehend perpetrators before the vehicles are stripped, driven out of the area, or loaded on a ship. Yet reports of stolen vehicles come to individual departments and are not made visible on a county-wide or regional basis in an effective manner. Reports are received and investigated by individual agencies, and paper flyers, faxes, mailings, or face sheets are distributed. Each of the individual CAD or RMS systems have a stolen vehicle module, although some are not used. The ability to browse across the electronic systems of each law enforcement agency’s stolen vehicle modules for method of theft, vehicle descriptions, VINS, license plates, etc., as soon as possible after the theft would provide a systemic, rapid solution. The Sheriff has 1.0 FTE entering stolen vehicle information into a custom module in the Tiburon RMS which is composed of 5 screens. The ability to “push” out electronic notices of car-jacked and stolen vehicles as soon as they happen may increase suspect apprehensions, aid in kidnap recoveries, and link common events to rings of car thieves.
B. Agencies Impacted Directly or Indirectly Sheriff’s Department Municipal Police Departments Other local law enforcement
District Attorney investigators Probation investigators Highway Patrol, FBI, etc.
C. Computer Systems Potentially Involved Sheriff’s Department – Tiburon Antioch – Data911 (Viper) (have RFP process underway) Brentwood – Data911 Clayton – Homegrown - CMS Concord – Homegrown - CMS Danville – Tiburon El Cerrito – Aegis Hercules – Aegis Kensington – Aegis Lafayette – Tiburon Martinez – Data911
Moraga – Tiburon Oakley - Tiburon Orinda – Tiburon Pinole – Aegis Pittsburg – Tiburon Pleasant Hill –Imagis Richmond – Aegis San Pablo – Aegis San Ramon – Tiburon Walnut Creek – Tiburon Bold=Sheriff’s Contract
D. Possible Technical Approach 1. A master database of stolen vehicle report data could be
created and made accessible to the web on a web services server.
2. With proper permissions, it could upload the data from the various systems on a one-time basis.
3. The constituent systems above all maintain a log showing new records and updated records by date and time.
4. These logs could be read and just the new data entered in each system could be appended to the master, web-based database.
5. Patrol and Investigators could query their own records and then link to the county-wide data as needed.
6. The Sheriff plans to upgrade to RMS 7.2 which is a browser-based system. That can serve as a core.
E. Implementation Steps Anticipated 1. Agree upon security privileges among different users. 2. Agree upon functional requirements of the system. 3. Obtain MOU with all participating agencies. 4. Determine method to get data out to the MDTs in vehicles. 5. Determine the frequency of update of the master database.
6. Write trigger routines for automatically updating the new information from each agency into the database.
7. Convene temporary workgroup to guide development of the system.
8. Locate home for system in Sheriff’s IT department?
F. Management of System 1. Designate the Contra Costa County members of the Bay Area
Crime Analysis Association to oversee system. 2. Rotate the chairmanship among members on an annual basis.
3. Meet with Sheriff’s IT staff monthly with a checklist of improvements to be made.
4. Assign existing staff person in Sheriff’s IT to monitor and make changes as needed.
G. Budget Approximations and Possible Sources of Funding 1. Consultant Training Developer (3 months x 20 days) x ($125).
$7.5K 1. Cost sharing by participating agencies.
H. Project Rating Provides Better Data
Improves Public/Staff Safety
Increases Efficiency
Saves Money
Inexpensive to Implement
Easy To Implement
Builds Needed Infrastructure [Y/N]
Total (100)
(20)32
(20) (15) (15) (15) (15) (a) 100+
14833
136 109 47 66 70 5 576
32
These are the number of points each committee member could give a project using these weighted criteria 33
These are the aggregate total points given by all members to this particular project.
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There are Many Kinds of Integration
The terms “Sharing” and “Integrated Justice” are thrown around fairly loosely. But many kinds of integration can be implemented such as the following:
Table 7.0 Examples of Different Types of “Integration”
Sharing data from one source to many – Example – The sheriff’s jail data are made available through ARIES to all 25 law enforcement agencies in the county in “real time” which eliminates many telephone calls to the jail.
Sharing data from many sources to many agencies – Example - A web application in ARIES serves up the Records Management System data from 25 agencies such that all 25 can view each others data in a uniform format.
Creating new applications from unexploited data – Example – Manual protective orders are keyed into a system which all agencies can now view including the judges who issued the orders who previously had no electronic record to query to review their own orders. In many ways ARIES is an opportunist. The system finds data that other need and serve it up for them under security privileges.
Serving up data in new combinations – Example – One can query mugshots from the Contra Costa County Jail, from each of the 25 agencies’ RMS systems and from the Alameda County Jail data for a broad universe from which to make strong six pack line-ups.
Pushing Data from System A to System B – Example - The California sends a printed Agency Notification of the Positive Identification of a person. A copy of that print job is saved in a subdirectory for Contra Costa County ARIES system. Every 15 minutes ARIES queries that subdirectory for new records and parses the information into a SQL database which is now available for query by all 48 agencies in the two counties. In another example, in Butte County, CA the booking information from the Motorola OffenderTrack system of the jail is pulled every night and is pushed to the Constellation Damion system of the District Attorney.
The listing of Contra Costa County integration projects shown below in Table 7.0 is illustrative of this. Note the two columns on the right which classify the type of integration achieved by each project.
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Table 8.0: Integration Projects by Type of Integration TYPE OF PROJECT BROWSE
34 PUSH
35
PROBLEM 1.0 - IDENTIFYING PERSONS OF INTEREST
1. A Consolidated Master Name Index •
2. A Unique County-Wide Identity Number •
3. Access to DOJ Agency Notification “Tape Strip” Data •
4. A Quick Positive ID Fingerprint Verification Scan •
5. A Consolidated Master Mug Shot System •
6. Querying Alameda County Systems •
7. County-Wide Gang Name/Affiliation Database •
8. County-Wide Stolen Vehicle Database •
9. Sharing Inter-Department Incident (Police Reports) •
10. Consolidating Court Searches Across Different Databases •
11. Access to Restraining Orders •
PROBLEM 2.0 - LOCATING PERSONS OF INTEREST
12. Real-Time Jail Information •
13. Message Switch Queries •
14. Access to Probation Data •
15. Access to Office of Revenue Collection Data •
16. Retrieval of Outstanding Local Warrant Lists from JAWS •
17. Retrieval of 290 Sex Offender & Other Registrant Addresses •
18. Public Defender - Related Social Services Information •
19. Coroner’s Information •
20. Access to County GIS Database •
21. Access to Assessor & Recorder’s Data •
22. Access to Court Juvenile Data •
23. Access to District Attorney Data •
PROBLEM 3.0 - DETERMINING THE STATUS OF A CASE
24. Criminal Justice Case Status Information •
25. Notification of Prosecutions •
26. Juvenile Hall Status Information •
27. Subpoenaed Law Enforcement Witness “Call off” •
28. District Attorney – Access to Defense Witnesses •
29. Access to DA Case Dispositions •
30. Access to Court Information •
31. Access to Selected Child Support Services Information •
PROBLEM 4.0 - MANAGING EVIDENCE AND PROPERTY
32. Access to Property Room Inventory •
33. Disposition of Property •
34. A County-Wide Pawned Ticket System •
35. Crime Lab Results •
PROBLEM 5.0 - INCREASING EFFICIENCY
36. Uniform Electronic Pre-Booking Data •
37. Elimination of Traffic Citation Double Entry •
34
Meaning the user needs to know something but not necessarily have it resident in their own application. Everyone needs to know if a certain person is in jail this second. All HRI browsing applications have the ability to print out a record, to select which portions of a record they wish to print by closing or opening panels, or to cut and paste information needed in their own document. 35
Data is selected from system A, and then is pushed into selected fields in system B, thereby eliminating duplicate data entry.
31
TYPE OF PROJECT BROWSE34
PUSH35
38. Availability of Officer Schedules for Court Appearances •
39. Access to DA Complaints On-Line •
40. Automation of the Probable Cause Approval System •
PROBLEM 6.0 MAINTAINING EXISTING INTEGRATION
41. Integration with Court Case Systems •
42. Integration with Juvenile & Adult Probation •
43. Integration with the District Attorney •
44. Integration with the Public Defender •
PROBLEM 7.0 RESEARCH & EVALUATION & PLANNING
45. County-Wide Crime Analysis •
46. Criminal Justice System Workflow Statistics •
48. Electronic Completion of 8715 Reports to DOJ •
STEP 5.0: SETTING PRIORITIES The ARIES Committee established weighted criteria to use in setting priorities among the 40+ integration projects suggested by the criminal justice community. The higher points awarded for public and officer safety projects moves them higher on the list than for projects that are focusing on improvements for business reasons.
Figure 7.0: Weighted Scoring Criteria for Integration Projects
Weighted Scoring CriteriaWeighted Scoring Criteria
PointsPointsCriteriaCriteria
Y/NY/N7. Builds needed infrastructure7. Builds needed infrastructure
15 Points15 Points6. Is not complex to implement6. Is not complex to implement
15 Points15 Points5. Is inexpensive to implement5. Is inexpensive to implement
15 Points15 Points4. Saves money that can be reallocated4. Saves money that can be reallocated
15 Points15 Points3. Improves effectiveness3. Improves effectiveness
20 Points20 Points2. Improves safety to community & officers2. Improves safety to community & officers
20 Points20 Points1. Provides better data1. Provides better data
While the above looks like a fairly clinical and fair method for establishing priorities among competing projects, it did not replace the political process. When the rating scores were aggregated, some persons on the committee who did not like the results would make motions to move some projects up the priority list at the expense of higher-rated ones.
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The Committee also analyzed each project to determine which agencies would be impacted by the project. Partially this was to attempt to provide some sort of parity among the agencies to spread the benefit around so that one agency or one component of the justice system didn’t receive the majority of the benefit.
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Table 9.0: SHARING PROJECTS AND AGENCIES THAT WOULD BENEFIT
No.
Problem Areas & Projects
Law Enf.
D.A.
Defense
Court
Prob.
ORC
EHS
Rating
Score
Identifying Persons
1. Master Name Index g g g g g g g 619
2. Unique County-Wide ID Number g g g g g g g 578
3. Access to Certified ID DOJ AFIS Data g g g g 578
4. Positive ID Fingerprint System g g g g g g g NR36
5. Consolidated Mug shots/DMV g g g g 649
6. Access to Alameda’s 23 Agencies’ Data g g g g g g g NR
7. County-Wide Gang Name Assoc. g g 625
8. County-Wide Stolen Vehicles g g 576
9. Sharing Incident Reports g g 538
10. Querying Court Criminal & Civil Cases g g 442
11. Access to all Restraining Orders g g g g g NR
11a County-Wide Criminal Histories g g g g g g g 645
Locating Persons
12. “Real Time” jail Information g g g g g g 623
13. Access to Message Switch Archive g g g g g g g NR
14. Access to Probation Data g g g g 677
15. Access to Revenue Collection Data g g g 530
16. Improve Warrants & Service g g g 644
17. Access to Registrant Information g g g 592
18. Access to Social Services Data g g g g g 418
19. Access to Coroner Database g g g g g g 364
20. Access to County GIS Data g g g g 564
21. Access to Assessor/Recorder’s Data g NR
22. Access to Court Juvenile Data g g g 367
23. Access to District Attorney Data g37
g 451
Determining Case Status
24. Query Court Case Status g g g g g 623
25. Early Notification of Prosecutions g g NR
24. Access Court Case Data g g g g g g g 623
25. Juvenile Hall Status Information g g g NR
26. Access DA Witness Waive-offs g g g 541
36
These projects emerged later after the initial rating had been done. 37
The Public Defender handles LPS, Juvenile 300 W&I, OSC and other cases where the data is in the Civil database only.
34
No.
Problem Areas & Projects
Law Enf.
D.A.
Defense
Court
Prob.
ORC
EHS
Rating
Score
27. DA Access to Defense Witness List g 367
28. Access to DA Dispositions g g NR
29. Access Court Calendar g g g g g g 451
30. Access Court Dispositions g g g g g 451
31. Access Court Minutes g g g g 451
32. Access Probation Status Data g g g g g g 677
33. Complete DOJ 8715 On-Line g g g 623
34. Access Court Restraining Orders g g g 488
35. Access to Child Support Information g g g g NR
Managing Evidence/Property
36. Access to Property Records g g 361
37. Access to Court Dispositions g g g 451
38. Access to Central Pawn Data g 394
39. Access to Crime Lab Reports g g g 460
Increasing Efficiency
40. Electronic Pre-Booking Data g 570
41. Uniform/Digital Traffic Citation g g 458
42. Officer Training/Vacation Schedules g g g NR
40. Access DA Complaints g g g g g 379
41. Access to DA NCF g g 379
Maintaining Integration
42. Interfacing to New Court System g g g g g g g NR38
43. Interfacing to New Probation System g g g g g NR39
44. Interfacing to New D.A. System g g g g g NR40
Planning & Research
45. County-Wide Crime Analysis g g g g g 460
46. County Wide Justice Statistics g g g g g NR
47. Ad-Hoc Queries g g g g g g g 403
38
Refers to the situation after the court moves to a new state system and no longer enters or inherits data to and from LJIS 39
Refers to the situation should Probation move to a new case management system and stop entering/receiving data from LJIS 40
Refers to the situation if the D.A. moves to a new case management system and stops entering & receiving data from LJIS
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STEP 6.0: A 3-YEAR STRATEGIC INTEGRATION PLAN
A three-year strategic plan (with the following table of contents) was developed and approved along with a policy that it be reviewed annually in the first ARIES committee meeting of the year. During that review, the committee does the following:
1. Determines the status of each project in the current workplan 2. Identifies significant changes in the criminal justice environment41 over the past year 3. Reviews changes in legislation that might impact integration 4. Reviews what financial resources they have lined up for the upcoming fiscal year 5. Resets the priorities among the remaining applications
Because the annual budget year for the agencies starts in July, the early analysis of what has been accomplished during the past project year and what might be required from the agencies in that cycle allow them to earmark resources in their budget preparation documents early in the budget process.
Figure 8.0: Strategic Integration Plan
3-YEAR
STRATEGIC
INTEGRATION
PLAN
CONTRA COSTA COUNTY
INTEGRATED JUSTICE
INFORMATION SYSTEMS
PROJECT
Martinez, CA 94553
(925) 313-2425
TABLE OF COTENTS
1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
2. BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE
3. DESCRIPTION OF EXISTING INTEGRATED JUSTICE SYSTEMS
4. TYPES OF INTEGRATION SYSTEMS
5. COUNTY EFFORTS IN OTHER AREAS OF THE NATION
6. DATA EXCHANGE POINTS ANALYSIS IN CRIMINAL JUSTICE
7. INTEGRATION & SHARING NEEDS
8. ALTERNATIVE INTEGRATION STRATEGIES
9. RECOMMENDED INTEGRATION STRATEGY
10. ARIES TECHNICAL INFRASTRUCTURE
11. UNDERLYING TELECOMMUNICATION INFRASTRUCTURE
12. SECURITY PLAN
13. TRAINING PLAN
14. STAFFING PLAN
15. ESTIMATED EXPENSES
16. ANNUAL PLAN REVIEW PROCESS
17. WORK PLAN – FY 2003/04
18. WORK PLAN – FY 2004/05
19. WORK PLAN – FY 2005/06
20. PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION SCORECARD
41
The state court administration determined that they were going to convert all the local court management systems to a new (not yet developed) system which would mean the other agencies would lose integration with the courts. This meant that ARIES needed to add projects to the workplan to retain the existing integration.
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STEP 7.0: ALTERNATIVE INTEGRATION APPROACHES The team considered four alternative methods of achieving integrated justice systems among 25 law enforcement agencies, the District Attorney, the Public Defender, the Courts, Probation and other related agencies. The “Big Bang” Approach
This is the approach taken by the province of Ontario Canada, Washington DC, McLean County, IL, Ventura County, CA, Spartanburg County, SC, Miami-Dade County, FL, and Nashville-Davidson County, TN. These are systems that were built from the ground up over a large number of years with a significant budget, generally provided by the federal grants. With the exception of Miami-Dade County, the other integrated systems don’t have the number of municipal departments that Contra Costa County has. In this process, all the departments generally develop requirements for what the system will contain, and there has to be a lot of agreement, especially among police departments, on what they want in the system. The system is designed and implemented with enforcement, prosecution, defense, and probation modules intact. The Data Warehouse Approach
Data is transferred from all the contributing systems in the county to an actual or a virtual42 data warehouse. This is essentially what the integration project in Sacramento has done. They use a batch process several times during the day to transfer newly created or modified records from their IBM mainframe to two different SQL data bases where it is more easily queried and manipulated. The agencies can then:
1. Query case information 2. Browse across the entire database for information and patterns 3. Perform and save re-usable statistical analyses 4. Create routine, complex queries and reports 5. Train the user groups on how to do ad hoc reporting against the data 6. Perform ad hoc queries and reporting
Just dumping the data into various tables would be considered a “Data Store.” The differentiation generally applied to a “data warehouse” is that much more analysis is provided, and canned analytical reports are available (and reusable) off the shelf in the warehouse. For instance, dynamic43 crime statistics of this year over last year can be designed and put on the shelf for users to view. The flow of criminal justice workload statistics through the entire system from CAD or officer observed crimes through sentencing can be documented and analyzed. The amount of sophistication possible is only limited by the imagination, amount of funding, and the availability of skilled analysts. The Browser-Based Sharing/Integration Approach
Under this concept all existing data systems stay in place with no changes being required in the structure of the host systems. The jail system, for instance, continues operating as it has for several years, but the database can be browsed at any time while the users are entering and updating data. The Records Management Systems of each law enforcement agency may be browsed to seek the name of a person at the same time that the records clerks are using the system. This is the best of
42
In a virtual warehouse, middleware reads and configures data from the various systems into RAM, but it does not physically move the data from the files. Hence, the data is still up-to-date and is constantly refreshed in RAM. 43
Meaning that once the report is formatted, the updated statistical data is continually fed into the template for users to view and print.
37
both worlds because agencies can continue to use the systems they prefer and are able to query data from other agencies. The Pulling & Pushing Data Between Systems Approach
This approach would use aggressive “push” and “pull” technology to enter data by the owner agency as at present, then push the data to other data systems. It can be applied mostly between law enforcement agencies and the jail, law enforcement agencies and the District Attorney, and among the District Attorney, the Public Defender, the Courts, Probation and other county departments. The major advantage is that it could eliminate a lot of duplicate data entry, data entry errors, and calendar time for data to be entered sequentially by several agencies. The major disadvantage is the amount of disruption, technical analysis and planning required to accomplish it. Interfaces would have to be written for each receiving system to accept and transform data from the sending database. This is especially difficult now for the District Attorney, Court, and Probation department which may be moving to new systems within the next two years. Interfacing to their requirements in the LJIS and ISD systems at this time would be wasted effort, since their destination systems will have changed. In addition this calls for a great deal of cooperation among the various case management system vendors, which is not something they are readily willing to provide. Browser-Based – The Preferred Alternative
The major advantages of this approach are the following:
1. The ability to share the data in a much shorter time. One doesn’t have to spend the huge amount of time to re-design an integrated system from scratch.
2. The approach doesn’t mess with the host data systems application. It only reads the underlying data.
3. Nearly all users have a familiarity with the web and know intuitively how to navigate in that environment.
4. The data is always current. It is not physically moved anywhere. 5. The “Owner” agency still can control what data is shared. 6. Problems are easier to track down and modify 7. If one of the departments change software, it is generally an easy transition to interface to
the new system because only the template needs be updated. Note: Strangely enough, from a public policy perspective, one of the negatives of this approach is that while it extends the life of the underlying system and wrings extra value out of the previously expended capital to purchase, install, and maintain it, it also can extend the life of the old program by making it workable and patching features and functionality around the weaknesses of the old system. Many large urban counties in California are held hostage by 20 year old mainframes that run their primitive, pseudo integrated systems. The data are not integrated on the mainframe. They are “collocated” and in many cases act as a very expensive log sheet where users key in status information for their department only, but inherit no information previously entered by another department. For instance, in a witness “call off” system for law enforcement agencies to see whether or not the DA still needs them to appear, the ARIES system reads the mainframe and formats the data in such a way that the users can query all of their cases for the foreseeable future, query by defendant’s name or docket number, and perform many functions that the underlying mainframe application does not allow. However, the court clerks are still keying in data into an old green screen application and many are still using it notwithstanding its limited features. So instead of replacing the ineffective system, we use the modern integration technology to patch around it to provide a composite, workable solution for the users.
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STEP 8.0: TECHNICAL APPROACH - MIDDLEWARE The Hunter Research, Inc. project team did an exhaustive search of 54 middleware packages as a means of (1) quickly interfacing with different databases and (2) shortening the time it takes to go from conception to the production of a web-based application. All of the following are classes of middleware with acronyms that are very difficult to understand and distinguish. These categories seem like marketing constructs that don’t really convey what benefits they provide. The Imagis Technologies’ (now Visiphor) integration tool (Briyante) stood out because it was middleware with a twist. It allows one to develop a rapid web based application and shields one from a lot of the complexity of .NET development.
Figure 9.0: New Marketing Acronyms Emerging Around Integration
Not only did the project team analyze these categories of middleware, but they also explored the confusing array of brand names of middleware software. Third party reviews were obtained and exhaustive searching was done for (1) good descriptions of what they do, and (2) evaluative information from reviewers and users of the respective packages. These are the middleware packages the team reviewed44.
44
This resulted in a fifty page document comparing all the various products. HRI continues to try to keep up with the many mergers and acquisitions as big fish swallow smaller fish and rename them or kill them, as new players come into the market, and as vendors rename and modify products to capture attention and market share. Much of the action in this space is an elaborate marketing game where actual performance and proofs of delivery are sadly lacking. Try to find articles about SOA for instance on “What we did.’, rather than “What we plan to do.” or “All the things you must consider when doing SOA.”
39
Figure 10.0: Examples of Middleware Products
ACTIONAL
ACTUATE
ALTIO LIVE
ARTECH
BEA WEBLOGIC
BRIO
BUSINESS OBJECTS
CANDLE PATHWAY
CAPE CLEAR
CLEVER PATH
COGNOS
COMMERCE ONE
CROSS WORLDS
DIGITAL HARBOR
ENSEMBLE
FIORANO
GRAND CENTRAL
HYPERION
IBM WEBSPHERE
IBOLT
INFORMATICA
INFRAVIO
INTERSYSTEMS
IONA ARTIX
IPLANET
LAZLO
M7 APPLICATION
MICROSOFT BIZTALK
MICROSTRATEGY
NERVANA
ORACLE 9iAS
Q-LINK
SEE BEYOND
SIEBEL SYSTEMS
SONIC
SYPHERLINK
SYSBASE
SYSTINET
TEMPLAR INFORMANT
TIBCO
VITRIA
WEBMETHODS
WRQ
The project team made a continuum of functionality for middleware as a means of classifying where each package starts and stops in its ability to get one from concept to working application on the web. Some of the larger companies have a cluster of related products that one assumes (but it isn’t necessarily so) that purchasing all of them might provide a complete set of tools to do the job. But that would be extremely expensive and complex. The team classified the different brands and models. The Briyante System from Visiphor Corporation (formerly known as Imagis Technologies) was the only one that allowed the team to rapidly develop and deploy successful web applications. Once the team developed the look and feel of the user interface in terms of panels on the web page, font size, types, and colors, they were able to construct and launch new applications on the same template within weeks rather than months or years. To almost eliminate programming HRI developed a configurator system which is composed of tables that enable developers to add, delete, and modify factors in the Web Services application such as panels, frames, tables, header names, data elements, security tables, users, etc., and make major or minor changes even while users are on the system. This has enabled HRI to rapidly add new data sources and modules as the system evolves.
40
Figure 11.0: From Integration Concept to Successful Web Applications
SERENDIPITY AND LUCK The neighboring county (Alameda) invited the project manager to a show and tell presentation by a vendor, Imagis Technologies, Inc., (now known as Visiphor Corporation), who had provided a small arrest and booking front end with a mug shot system and facial recognition software for the county and all the cities therein. During the presentation, the presenter inadvertently hit a combination of keystrokes that revealed the code behind the code, which is a hallmark of the Microsoft .NET, Web Services method of presenting information. Based on that slip of the digits, the project manager could see that the Briyante middleware development tool which was used to make the demonstration was modular in nature, and represented a much faster way of integrating disparate databases and getting applications together in a much shorter time. The Hunter Research, Inc. project team had previously developed web-based, integrated justice products for the City and County of San Francisco and had developed a sort of “Google for Justice” environment wherein users could key in text strings, or Boolean arguments, and search across the police records, incident reports, property room, and court data. However, that application was constructed with Cold Fusion, Oracle databases, and stored procedures, plus XML and SOAP, and was difficult and time-consuming to develop. The project team invited Visiphor Corporation technical staff to come to the county and demonstrate how their product could attach to a live database, which they did. Using a laptop and their tool, within 20 minutes, their developer had attached to the Jail Management System’s Oracle database and was showing search data in “real time.” Inasmuch as the project team had a deliverable due within three weeks for their first prototype of shared data for the county, they invited themselves up to Visiphor Corporation headquarters in Vancouver, B.C. to learn how to use the tool as a means of shortening their time to develop the prototype. In three days they had learned enough to master the tool and to begin building their first prototype. Upon returning to Martinez, CA, they developed the rudimentary web services application for querying information from the jail management system, linking to a separate mug shot system for the most current booking photo, then linking up with a third photo system that contained all mug shots going back to 1992. This was all achieved using the Briyante Integration tool.
41
STEP 9.0: INTERFACING TO THE MAINFRAME Nearly any county of any size (or company for that matter) has a lot of their official information locked up in a mainframe, be it CABLE in San Francisco, CJIS in Sacramento, CJIS in San Joaquin County, CJIC in Santa Clara, LJIS in Contra Costa, etc. These systems are locked down pretty tightly and are very difficult to get to because many of them have the data stored in non relational databases, so access to them is a challenge. At the same time, most of these systems provide very rudimentary services to the users, and they cost the user a lot of money. The sad facts are that these systems are operated by mainframe shops with very senior (and very expensive) employees with the mainframe skills that don’t transfer well to the PC and LAN/WAN world. All of the larger counties in California, except Marin County, operate on a chargeback system to the departments, meaning that the mainframe IT shop has high fixed costs for keeping their mainframes running, so they charge the county departments a pro-rata share to pay the expense. As agency applications are taken off the mainframe and put on client server or web services systems in the departments, the remaining departments get charged more and more for less and less service45. This is not a good business model, but the large counties employ it nonetheless. Most of the counties measured the number of transactions consumed in the 70s by the Sheriff, the District Attorney, the Court, and the Probation Department and established the annual ratio that each department would pay for the cost of operating the mainframe. None that we have experience with will recalculate what those ratios are today, because they don’t want users to know (a) how little the mainframe is being used and (b) how much they and each of their peers are getting charged for IT services46. Having said all of the above, nearly half of the justice sharing or integration projects defined by the ARIES Committee and the project team require interface to the mainframe to get data that is being pumped into that very expensive resource, then to get it out to the departments in a more convenient and cheaper way. Not only do they involve interface, but they require “real time” information, not regular COBOL-generated dumps of data out to an out-of-date file. In addition, the municipal law enforcement agencies generally do not have access to the mainframes, either to search for information or to input information from their records. So those integrated mainframe systems lack most of the RMS data maintained by the municipalities within the County. After extensive searching, the project team brought in two vendors to prove that that they could read and convert data from the CA IDMS database of the OS390-225 mainframe to ODBC or OLEDB compatible data that the Visiphor Corporation Middleware (Briyante) needs to convert and display on the web pages. One vendor could do ODBC but not the more robust OLEDB which Briyante preferred. The team selected IBI’s iWAY adapter and, while it has worked from a technical perspective, it is very slow to respond and the County IT staff sometimes failed to re-initiate the ARIES integration job when they take their systems down for a variety of purposes. With all the cycles of power the mainframes have, they should be very fast in returning their responses, but they aren’t. Recently, the ARIES project paid iWAY to spend two days to figure out how to speed up the mainframe processes, which they did and improved the response time by six times.
45
We attended a meeting with the probation department and County IT staff and the discussion was on costs and what would happen when the Court, a major user of the system, is taken off the county system and transferred to the state. The IT representative answered, “Well, each of you remaining departments will just have to pay more.” 46
We were invited by the IT director of San Francisco County to listen to a proposal from a large neighboring county. The offer was something like this. “You know, we have the same mainframe and operating system as you and we have this integrated (CJIS and outgrowth of the old Atkinson system). We have about the same budget as you and our staff are about the same. At the end of next year we will only have 1 small application left on the mainframe. How about us providing our integrated justice system for you.
42
Several of the county IT shops have continued to upgrade their mainframe systems even at a time when fewer and fewer applications are running on them. This only extends the time that they will be dependent upon them and their high maintenance costs will persist. This has been the case in Contra Costa and Sacramento Counties.
Figure 12.0: Contra Costa County Integration Environment
COUNTY-WIDE INTRANET
IBM ES2003 Mainframe
IDMS
District Attorney
Public Defender
Court (Criminal)
Probation
AS400
Warrants
BRIYANTE
JUSTICE
INTEGRATION
SYSTEM
IDMS
INTERFACE
CRIMINAL
ID AND
PRINTS
SHERIFF’S
JAIL
MGMT.
CORONER
DATABASE
& PHOTOS
COURT
CIVIL
TRAFFIC
JUVENILE
SOCIAL
SERVICES
DATA
REVENUE
RECOVERY
DATA
ASSESSORS
DATA
DAC
DAC
DAC
DAC DAC
SHERIFF’S
COUNTY-
WIDE MUG
SHOTS
JUSTICE COMMUNITY USERS
DAC
DAC
Internet Explorer
DAC25 LAW
ENFORCEMENT
RMSs
COUNTY
ARCVIEW
GIS
DATABASE
DAC
Explanation:
1. The user only needs a Wintel PC, and Internet Explorer 5.0 and above (or comparable), access to the secure criminal justice Intranet, a user name, and a password to participate.
2. The ARIES system requires just one fixed user name and password to access a data source. 3. The user selects the applications they want to run and the data sources they want to query. 4. After entering their search parameters such as a name, data of birth, case number, etc., their request for
information goes to the Imagis (now Visaphor Corporation) Briyante middleware server, which fires off simultaneous SQL select statements and related instructions to the Data Access Components (DACs) which are connected to the network where the data source servers operate.
5. Generally the ARIES system does not move any information, but reads it in place in “real time” in order ensure that the data are absolutely current. There are several exceptions.
6. Briyante returns the requested data if available in Justice XML format, and the Web Services application presents the data in attractive (configurable) web pages in various panels and frames.
43
7. HRI’s ConfiguratorConfiguratorConfiguratorConfigurator47474747 product allows the developers to make many structural modifications to the
applications, even while users are logged on in terms of frames, panels, tables, backgrounds, column headings, column data elements, etc.
8. Users can save their transactions and specify how frequently and for how long they want ARIES to resubmit their query to see if there are any more hits. The system will then E-mail them if more information is found among all the data sources they specified.
Step 10.0: GETTING ORGANIZED FOR INTEGRATION
Setup The project team purchased modest servers; one for the web services application and a second for databases that might evolve, even though a design objective is to never move data unless it is absolutely necessary so that they data is always as current as the most recent keystroke in the underlying application. The team loaded Windows 2003 on the servers as the operating system and the Briyante Integration Server with Visual Studio and all the required utilities. The system operates as a Web Services cluster of applications in a .NET environment.
Connections The servers are connected to a county Intranet called ACCJIN which has operated within the county for fifteen years and is the conduit by which all the law enforcement agencies in the county (and some state and federal agencies) gain access to the statewide criminal history system called the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System (CLETS). The servers are connected to the Sheriffs LAN that connects the Corrlogic Jail Management System and the two mug servers with segment linkage to the ACCJIN Intranet.
Methodology Employing the Briyante middleware, the ARIES team links jail records by the unique CCIN number with a .jpg record in one or both of the mugshots servers and returns the jail records going back to 1982 with the mugshots from 1993 to date where they exist. A Web Service was created which enables the user to specify which characteristics they want, like names, DOB, AFIS number, jurisdiction, physical characteristics, scars, marks and tattoos, etc. They Briyante utility sends a SQL request to the databases, converts the returned information to Justice XML in the master server and presents the information to the user in attractive, easy-to-read web pages. An opening web page was developed with the normal housekeeping buttons of:
1. Logons and Security mechanisms for a. Lost password b. Changing roles, etc.
2. Applications 3. Member Agency home pages 4. Library of Documentation 5. Calendar of meetings 6. Members of various committees 7. An Online User Manual
47
While developing the ARIES project we spent an inordinate amount of time coding, testing, and debugging. So we developed a tool to help us make modifications rapidly without coding. This tool is very powerful and has helped us dramatically reduce development time in bring new modules from the data to the finished application.
44
Local Coordinators While the system is centrally administered, the maintenance of users by agency that can gain access, is decentralized. A single ARIES Coordinator per agency is assigned and given an Admin button on their opening page. They are the only ones that can add or delete users from their own agency. They can re-assign the role of coordinator when they go on vacation or to training or other activities that will take them out of the office for some time. When they assign the role to another authorized user in the agency, they immediately lose their Admin privileges. The coordinators add the names and assign specific roles to the persons they add, but they do not assign passwords nor enter the telephone and E-mail address. That is mandatory for the user to enter when they sign on for the first time via a button called Manage Your Account. All bulletins and announcements are sent to the coordinators who then distribute the information to their users.
Figure 13.0: ARIES Login Screen
Security and Different Roles A security committee was formed with representation across the justice system to assist in recommending security policies and procedures. They meet monthly and review all applications down to the data element level versus various roles of law enforcement, prosecution attorneys, public defenders, criminal court judges, clerks, etc. The project team designed in specific pages for the different roles. A user can have more than one role, and the intersection of those privileges determines what they can see. If a user does not have access to a specific application, a panel of data within an application, or even a specific data element, their version of the webpage will not display the functions, features, and data they cannot access. A person in the County IT security group was assigned several logons with each of the various roles so that they could (a) spot check and ensure that certain roles could only see certain data and (b) to attempt to break in or compromise the system
45
Designing the System with Middleware Designing the system was accomplished with the steps shown below. There was a learning curve, and the documentation wasn’t then, and still isn’t, what it should be, but then that is unfortunately the case in computerdom much of the time. The first application took some time and a lot of trial and error. However, one of the great things about Visiphor Corporation has been that when we have told them of a problem or suggested a feature that would make their product more useful or faster to develop, they have treated the suggestion (in some cases criticism) very positively and have generally made the changes in their product updates. This “can do” and “want to do” willingness is sincere and has extended over three years and enables a developer to not only use the tools but to help shape what the tool is and what it can do. This is very rare outside of open ware.
46
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48
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Making Faster Progress One of the developers on the team reasoned that there must be faster ways to design and test the presentation layer than a lot of the coding we were doing. He devised a database integrated within the Web Service application that enables a developer to do the following timesaving processes either when developing or when making even the slightest modifications. Even while users are on the production system, the “ConfiguratorConfiguratorConfiguratorConfigurator” can go in and make the following types of changes.
a. New User Roles b. New Data Source Agencies c. New Search Parameters d. Design or Change the Number of Panels in the Web Page e. Design or Change the Number of Columns in a Presentation Table f. The Words in the Header of a Column Name g. The Colors of Panels and Frames and Fonts, Etc. h. The Data Elements to be Displayed in the Tables. i. Etc.
This allows the developers to form an assembly line to make rapid integration development progress from the moment user groups determine a new application is needed until they are looking at a working prototype that can moved into production very rapidly. We use the following steps.
Table 10.0: Rapid Integration Development Steps
Step Process Explanation
1. Do due diligence on the nature & scope of the problem
What is the problem? How is it manifest? Who is impacted? Why is it important? Are there any other agencies or systems that can solve the problem
48?
2. Document the current work flows of the agencies involved.
You need to document how they now do business so that any new design or system will be workable and feasible for the agencies involved.
3. Document all data systems involved
Document systems, operating systems, databases, networks, tables, dictionaries, file sizes, records, etc.
4. Use Middleware to read the databases to be shared
Briyante reads, transforms, and presents the data from the various sources in a .Net format.
5. Use HRI ConfiguratorConfiguratorConfiguratorConfigurator to
format the application
The ConfiguratorConfiguratorConfiguratorConfigurator formats the web pages, the panels,
frames, buttons, colors, fonts, tables, user privileges, security parameters, etc.
6. Prototype the Beta application to subject matter user experts
By using a real prototype with real data, the users can see the potential of the system as well as the bugs or aspects that need to be improved.
7. Modify, test, and QA the application
This ensures the system will fit and also builds excitement among the users as they help shape the application.
8. Put the system into production We cut over at 5:00 P.M. and send out bulletins to the coordinators to alert their users.
9. Document the “as built” system Create technical documentation for the agency IT persons that may have to support the application as well as user manuals
9. Train users The system should be designed to be simple and intuitive, but training probably will be necessary.
The specific projects that were developed and implemented into production are described below with the methodology and explanatory comments in the order they were undertaken.
48 For instance, the users wanted us to develop a system that would read the mugshots of a neighboring county, but we found out
the state was developing a system to let all counties query mugshots on a state-wide basis, so the need evaporated.
51
PROJECT 1.0: Sharing Jail Data with all Agencies
The Problem: All justice agencies and departments need information from the jail on who got arrested and booked, who is still there, who is bailing out, who is being released, which facility they are being held in, are they coming to court, etc. The municipalities especially lack this information and are thus forced to call the jail with a high volume of telephone calls, e-mails, and faxes. The jail was sending a listing of who was in jail every morning at 4:00 A.M. to the other justice agencies, but most of the releases for the day are done at 6:00 A.M. so that data was out of date when they came into work at 9:00 A.M.
Figure 14.0: Jail & Mugshot Integration System
“Real Time” Shared Jail Data
(One to Many)
““Real TimeReal Time”” Shared Jail DataShared Jail Data
(One to Many)(One to Many)
a. All 25+ law enforcement agencies
b. Welfare Fraud
c. Prosecutor
d. Public Defender – (Who is in jail now – Only)
e. Courts
f. Probation
Jail System Linked to 2 mug shot servers
Methodology: The Jail Management System is by CorrLogic and runs in a Unix environment. Corrlogic has subsequently been purchased by another company, but still runs substantially as it was installed. Mugshots are maintained in a central server for most of the agencies in the county. The Mugshot System is by PictureLink and is maintained on two servers. The primary server maintains the most recent mugshot taken of a person who is assigned a unique CCIN number for the county. A second server maintains the archived mugshots of persons booked and shows repeat offenders as they evolved through the criminal justice system as well as the fashion world with orange hair, dredlocks, clean shaven, beards, as well as weight gains and losses over the years. Five of the municipal departments have their own mugshot systems which include Data911, Visaterm, PS-Net, and a homegrown system.
52
PROJECT 2.0: Sharing RMS Data
The Problem: Like Google for cops, tremendous benefits can come from allowing agencies to share each other’s data in real time. ARIES as a rule does not move data anyplace when it is critical that (a) it be current, and (b) there is only one source of truth of the current status of case data. In the early days, we used to consolidate data into large data warehouses, but it was out of date the moment it left the original host. One might find an active warrant in a repository that was recalled moments later in the source system. Old data or different data relied upon provides too many risks for costly mistakes.
Figure 15.0: Many to Many Integration Example
Connecting all RMS Systems in the CountyConnecting all RMS Systems in the CountyConnecting all RMS Systems in the County
Contra Costa Integration Server
Hercules
Pinole
Richmond
San Pablo
El Cerrito
Lafayette
Orinda
Moraga
Danville
San Ramon
Martinez
Pleasant Hill
Concord
Clayton
Walnut Creek
Pittsburg
Antioch
Oakley
Brentwood
Methodology: A modest server was installed in the equipment room of each law enforcement agency that was going to share their data.
1. The server was cabled to the local LAN with access to the secure County-wide Intranet and the RMS system that is to be read.
2. The server has Windows 2003 and Briyante installed on it, and Remote Services has been configured so that the Master Briyante server can communicate with the local Data Access Component. Its sole job is to communicate and to select the data users request through the Web Services application.
3. Close coordination with the local government IT staff, as well as the law enforcement agency IT staff, is necessary to make sure everything is set up. If you can ping the agencies RMS server from the development server, you are ready to go.
53
4. Each RMS agency is asked to enable a single user name for the integration server and a password.
5. Further a Memorandum of Understanding, MOU, was created, and all agencies executed it. Among the provisions in the MOU were the following:
a. Provision of data by the host agency was voluntary and could be discontinued at any time.
b. Provider agencies could share some data, but opt out of other data they considered too sensitive. For instance, some would not want their badge numbers available since their personnel and payroll files were keyed from that number.
c. Provider agencies would endeavor to keep their RMS systems as accurate49 and current as possible so that the data could be relied upon and would not incur any undue legal risks.
d. Querying agencies would safeguard the data they read off of the integrated system with the same care for security and privacy as they do their own systems as well as the state CLETS system.
Challenges: One of the major challenges is getting RMS vendors to cooperate. When they think of integration, they think it is possible that all the other RMS agencies will throw out their current system and purchase theirs. Some even claim to have regional or integration capabilities, but they sell very little regional installations. In some cases they feel that revealing the data structure of their tables will be compromising the family jewels, but the key is having the law enforcement client realize they have paid for a system, and the data contained therein is theirs. In some cases vendors were very willing to cooperate and provided the technical information readily. In other cases it was necessary to intuitively look at the files and the data within or enter test data to confirm that the data the agencies want to share can be is properly identified. Sometimes a vendor would threaten to discontinue support to the host agency if the production system was read by the ARIES system. In those cases, if reasoning did not work, or if the law enforcement agency was intimidated, we would work cooperatively with the vendor to perform simultaneous replication to another server, so that (a) we weren’t reading the production data, (b) there could be no degradation in response time because the queries would happen on the replicated server, and (c) the data would be very near “real time.” On some Oracle systems, the vendor was using older optimization schemes (Rules Based) which would frustrate our efforts to index the database for faster queries and responses. In these cases our indexes would be ignored. By getting a replicated Oracle database for us to query, we could optimize with Cost Based methods, which honor our indexes and speeded up the queries tremendously. Obviously data elements are different among systems both in terms of naming conventions, type of data, size, etc. This is illustrated in the matrix below of various systems that help ensure that we get apples and apples across the various source systems.
49
A design standard HRI follows is to show the source of each record in the far right hand column. This type of exposure can be embarrassing if the information is sloppy or has not been entered. In some cases the data entry person is not at fault at all. The RMS system may be designed poorly with no error checking, so that the operator can enter anything for an agency name or charge code, where a drop down table would ensure consistency of the entered data.
54
Tab
le 1
1.0
: E
xam
ple
of
Mis
matc
h A
mo
ng
Ag
en
cy R
MS
Syste
m D
ata
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ts
JA
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MS
A
GE
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AG
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C R
MS
A
GE
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S
VE
ND
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B
VE
ND
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OR
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JA
IL F
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F
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TA
BL
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TY
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ME
NT
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AB
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PersonLastNam
e NAME1
ALM
AST
AN30
LAST_N
AME
ALP
HA
AN12
LNAME
ID1M
ASTER
AN24
LAST_N
AME
ALP
HA
AN40
PersonF
irstNam
e Included
ALM
AST
Included
FIRST_N
AME
ALP
HA
AN20
GIVENM
ID1M
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PROJECT 3.0: Sharing Mainframe Court & DA Data
The Problem: Much of the information for the District Attorney, the Public Defender, the Courts, and Probation resides on a 15-year old collocated system on the mainframe. While these systems reside on the same host, they are not integrated per se. The DA has their module into which they pump information that may be duplicated in the Courts module on the same mainframe. The data is located on a mainframe with the following characteristics: Mainframe: ES2003 – 225 Operating System: OS390 Version 2.9 Security System: Resource Access Control Facility (RACF) Database: Computer Associates IDMS Version 14.1
Figure 16.0: Reduction of Unnecessary Overtime Pay
a. Prosecutor decides they don’t need officer Smith to testify
b. Subpoena clerk waives him off in the old mainframe system
c. ARIES reads the mainframe and pushes that information out to the officer’s agency
d. 25 agencies establish a policy that no officer leaves for court without checking ARIES to see if they are still wanted
e. Estimated cash $$$ savings (not in kind services) but dollars saved from the budget = $800,000 per year.
NOTIFICATION OF LAW ENFORCEMENT WITNESSESNOTIFICATION OF LAW ENFORCEMENT WITNESSES
The District Attorney issues a subpoena to a law enforcement witness to appear at a court matter. Very often the witness subpoenaed works the swing or night shift and has to appear in court in their off-duty hours for which they get compensated at 6 times their salary for a minimum of 2 hours. It is not unusual for the D.A. to decide at the last moment that the witness will not be needed. The DA’s subpoena clerk may call, leave a message with, or fax that fact to the officer’s department to “call them off.” In addition a hotline was established that was updated every weekday at 16:00 with information on whether or not the witnesses were still needed. Still, it was not unusual that the message wasn’t relayed to the officer in time to prevent them from coming to the court anyway. In fact, a rigorous analysis of all the agencies revealed over $800,000 of unnecessary overtime paid annually in these cases.
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Methodology: HRI hunted for some time to find adapters that would read the IDMS database in “real time” so that the moment the witness was to be called off, the DA subpoena clerk could input that fact into their mainframe application and ARIES could read and publish the most recent status to each and all agencies. iWAY adapters were selected to access the IDMS database on the mainframe. A modest Wintel server (Data Access Component) was installed in the County IT department’s equipment room and the iWAY IDMS adapter software was installed on it. The iWAY mainframe component was installed on the OS390 mainframe. The installation did not go as advertised nor as documented in agency materials, but ultimately it was made to work, although it was very slow. iWAY technicians spent two days on site working on joins with their product to greatly improve the speed.
Figure 17.0: “Real Time” Witness Appearance Notification
In the ARIES application, the user selects the Witness component and can search for subpoena activity by case, by agency, and by officer - retroactively as well as prospectively. The system reads the agency of the logged in user and provides the cases relevant to them. Behind the scenes, the iWAY adapter organizes the mainframe IDMS data into metadata in ODBC or OLEDB format which the Briyante middleware system retrieves via SQL select statements, transforms into XML formats, and presents them in the web page formats by way of the HRI ConfiguratorConfiguratorConfiguratorConfigurator.
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PROJECT 4.0: Connecting the DOTS
The Problem: At any given time agencies all over the county are running names and vehicles through the state CLETS system for wants and warrants as well as DMV status. Yet each may not be aware that another agency may be very interested in a person, vehicle, or evidence that one officer has detained. All the incoming and outgoing messages are archived on the CLETS server in the county which provides the opportunity to see who is stopping whom.
Figure 18.0: Connecting the dots in “Real Time”
S.O.
EB
RP
CORPUS
04/06/05 – 08:29:15
DMV
Smith, Ralph R,
85 Ford Taurus, Lic. 42348799
04/06/05 – 08:29:15
CLETS
Smith, Ralph R,Wants/Warrants
04/06/05 – 08:32:15
CLETSJohnson, Randolph Earl
Wants/Warrants
Methodology: The ARIES server in the equipment room is connected via a secure County Intranet to the network that accesses the CLETS archive server. The switch vendor, Level II, was paid to parse their archive data which was unstructured on the archive server into a SQL server database developed by HRI. When a transaction is submitted out to the state CLETS system and a new record is added to the archive, a SQL-transformed record is also added to the ARIES SQL database. ARIES adds approximately 28,000 transactions per day to this database and, unlike the archive, ARIES will not purge that data every six months. This is one of the exceptions to the ARIES design rule of not creating new databases. These data were not accessible without creating a new (but real time) database. The Briyante middleware queries the information just like the other RMS and jail databases. NOTE: ARIES is only reading the outgoing message so a user can tell who is running whom. Caution has been taken to ensure that ARIES is not reading the incoming, returned messages. While that would be extremely interesting, ARIES does not want to give the appearance of duplicating or competing with the CLETS functions. An exception is with the DMV data where the outgoing messages contain so little data that of themselves they are not very useful without the returned DMV data which ARIES reads and displays..
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PROJECT 5.0: Certified ID Backed by Prints
The Problem: Prior to the advent of the ARIES system, the county had no formal way to positively identify persons by fingerprints on a county-wide basis. While they submitted prints individually as they booked them, they had no immediate method to check the validity of names and ID numbers given to them. Electronic prints were rolled and submitted to the state Department of Justice (DOJ), but the returned information would not be received until hours later.
Figure 19.0: Local Certification ID Database
Certified Identification by FingerprintsCertified Identification by FingerprintsCertified Identification by Fingerprints
1. When any agency or the jail rolls prints in Livescan, they are automatically forwarded to Central ID who try to find a match in a joint Contra Costa and Alameda County print repository. If a match is found or not found, the prints are sent to the state DOJ and the FBI. The state DOJ sends back their match/no match message, AFIS number and state ID number.
2. ARIES reads those messages and stores them in a searchable database with unlimited AKAs and multiple SSNs or Driver’s Licenses, so that local
agencies can (a) certify who the party is, and can (b) correct their local RMS’s.
3. The court can also verify who the person is at arraignment, which data can be linked with a mug
shot to assist in that certification.
Methodology: For years the state DOJ had been providing a tape cartridge to the Central ID bureau of the Sheriff’s Office with records of all prints submitted by all agencies within the county for each month since mid 2000. These records had the AFIS number, the unique State Identification Number, names, unlimited AKAs as well as multiple Social Security Numbers, Driver’s licenses, etc., and were the certified identification of the persons whose prints had been submitted. HRI dumped all of these tapes into a reader on the mainframe, extracted all of this rich data, and converted it into a SQL server database that provides another county-wide source of data to help instantly identify persons. The California DOJ sends an agency notification letter (within two hours) which is a print job to a resident laser printer in the central ID bureau. At the same time, the DOJ writes that formatted print job to a record in a subdirectory on their mainframe. ARIES polls that subdirectory every 15 minutes and pulls down any new Agency Notifications that have been sent to Contra Costa County and appends them to six years worth of notifications in the local ARIES database. This is an exception to an ARIES design principal of only reading other agencies databases rather than maintaining its own. In this cases there was no database, just a formatted print job going to a printer.
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Now all ARIES users can see when any agency rolled a person’s prints, but in addition it has new, invaluable data they can obtain such as the following:
1. The true, verified identity of the person 2. The AFIS, state ID, and FBI numbers if present 3. All AKAs the person has ever used (unlimited) 4. All fake driver’s license numbers they have ever used (unlimited) 5. All fake Social Security numbers they have ever used (unlimited) 6. Last know addresses 7. Whether the person is a sex, arson, gang, or drug registrant 8. Whether the person has a valid DNA sample on file.
It was the manager of the Central ID bureau who saw the potential in this information that occupied the shelf in a closet for many years.
Figure 20 Sample Certified Identification Record
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PROJECT 6.0: Court Protective Orders
The Problem: During the “due diligence” workflow and requirements formulation phase of the project, the judges complained that once they issued a protective order (15 different varieties among civil and criminal case types), they had no way of retrieving the information, and that they could not remember what they had done in a particular case, let alone know what a peer judge had done with the same principals in another case. HRI staff thought that would be simple enough to read the court data and add it as an application in the ARIES collection of functions, but to our surprise this was not possible. A protective order or the fact that a protective order had been issued was nowhere in the two case management systems of the court. In a few cases a clerk might enter a comment in a “Notes” field or cannibalize a data element named something else with a notation about a protective order, and the paper document was filed in a folder.
Worse, law enforcement complained that as they responded to domestic disturbances it was not uncommon to find that the principals in a dispute might have conflicting or dueling protective orders, and the officer(s) had to make Solomon-like decisions in an emotionally-charged setting.
Methodology: The project team learned that while no electronic record was available to the courts, the information was being recorded somewhere. Every weekday afternoon after 16:00, a courier arrived at the Sheriff’s Records Unit with a pouch containing, among other things, all protective orders and proofs of service of the orders. These were entered into the state’s CLETS system and were submitted one-way to Sacramento. With the cooperation of the Sheriff’s Office and the Sheriff’s RMS vendor, Tiburon, Inc., the following were accomplished:
1. The RMS system has a linkage to go to CLETS and, with a few additions to the database record, the protective orders could be entered into the RMS System (a permanent record) and could still be submitted out the back door to CLETS. This required a small payment to the vendor.
2. The Sheriff’s Office had a document imaging system for scanning in its Incident or Police Reports with seven header data elements to facilitate searching and retrieval. The Sheriff’s Office agreed to start scanning in the protective orders and proofs of service into a separate database on the same server. The vendor was IKON and their product is called WebQuery.
3. The vendor agreed to (a) create a new database for the documents, and (b) make a few accommodations at no cost to the ARIES team to allow us to connect to the image database.
4. ARIES was already reading the Tiburon RMS where the court docket number could be picked up. The user selects the Protective Order application in ARIES and keys in a name or a court docket number. If a name is entered, ARIES will search the Tiburon RMS for the name as either a restrained person or a protected person and retrieve the record. If there is a case number, it contains a hyperlink to the document server of IKON where the actual multi-page .TIFF file is retrieved and converted into a .PDF file for viewing. Now the Family Law judges and law enforcement agencies can find and read all court orders and proofs of service and can view the history of the principals in a case and can, in addition, link over to criminal history information where relevant.
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Figure 21.0 Actual .PDF images of a Protective Order
PROJECT 7.0: Adding Alameda County Data
The Problem: Alameda County lies immediately south and southwest of Contra Costa County and, with their 1.5 million people and 23 law enforcement agencies, not to mention all the freeways connecting us, adding them would provide a population base of nearly 3.0 million people and data from 48 agencies. This would enable officers and investigators from both counties to enter a name or other search parameter and scan across all that information for hits.
Methodology: 1. Alameda County had implemented a common front-end Arrest and Booking module used by all
agencies within the county called CABS which, coincidentally, was created by Imagis Technologies (Visiphor), the same vendor that developed the Briyante Middleware. Therefore, all data and mugshots in the county were consistent and obtainable.
2. At the same time, the state was creating a shared mugshot repository called CalPhoto of booking and DMV photos in which Alameda agreed to participate.
3. The Alameda County Sheriff’s Office began replicating all mugshots over to a server, which was provided by the state, to be uploaded to Sacramento.
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4. Contra Costa County already shared a T-1 line with Alameda County for a common fingerprint repository. This line was underutilized so with agreement of both agencies, ARIES started using the line for Alameda County to access ARIES and for Contra Costa county to access their arrest and booking data plus mug shots.
5. Alameda County Sheriff’s Office installed a modest server, and Visiphor Corporation provided the Briyante Middleware which the ARIES staff helped the Alameda Sheriff’s Office install and configure.
Figure 22.0: Two Counties – 48 Law Enforcement Agencies
Hunter Research, Inc.
Project 7.0 Linking 2 Integrated CountiesProject 7.0 Linking 2 Integrated Counties
1. 23 Alameda County agencies with proper permissions can do a query in their Web Service and can query Contra Costa’s jail
data, mug shots, RMS systems, etc.
2. Contra Costa agencies can now read Alameda’s Web Services (integrated data)
3. Four other counties have asked to join
ARIES
Web
Services
6. A user may select Alameda County as a data source among the sources they want to query and can key in the parameters upon which they wish to search.
7. The ARIES Briyante Middleware fires off simultaneous messages to the selected databases with SQL select statements for the data elements they seek.
8. To hold down the amount of resources and time that one user might monopolize with a huge search on Smith or Martinez, for instance, the ARIES system artificially (configurable) limits the number of hits to 200 per database and advises the user to narrow their search by adding or modifying their search parameters.
9. The selected records and mugshots are returned and displayed in the ARIES WebPages with an indicator of which database(s) they are from and contact people within the originating agencies.
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PROJECT 8.0: AutoPilot Search & User Notification
The Problem: It is very time consuming for a detective with a lot of cases, particularly old capital cases, to have to continue to run linear searches on principals. It is also a time waster to have to call around to agencies to see if fellow officers have heard or obtained anything new on persons of interest. Shown below in Figure 23.0 is the ConfiguratorConfiguratorConfiguratorConfigurator, an AutoPilot system developed by HRI, that greatly increases the productivity and awareness of investigators.
Figure 23.0: New Data Automatically Found and User Notified
Methodology: 1. Using the HRI ConfiguratorConfiguratorConfiguratorConfigurator to enable it, the user can do an ad hoc search on one or all of the
data sources and can enter name, DOB, etc., for the search parameters they are seeking. 2. When they are satisfied with the returned data in terms of type and amount of information, ARIES
will ask them if they would like to save the query. If so, the user can type in a name of the query, and ARIES will save it as a file on the master server in a subdirectory for the user.
3. ARIES will ask how frequently the user would like ARIES to run it, for example every 5 minutes for a Megan’s Law case, or daily, weekly, etc.
4. ARIES will also ask for how many days or months they would like ARIES to continue to search. 5. Finally ARIES will institute the searches to match the user’s preferences and when any new
information appears among any of the data sources searched, ARIES will respond to the user with an E-mail or their log on message highlighting what the new information is.
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PROJECT 9.0: Six Pack Lineups
The Problem: Since the ARIES project now covers a large geographical area and many databases, an investigator can enter parameters and collect mugshots of similar persons from many sources. Most investigators can develop a six pack from their own RMS system or even from a state system called Cal Photo. However, their own RMS may not have enough “similars” for a good lineup and they complained that the Cal Photo system had some ease of use problems, so the ARIES team reluctantly created a very easy to use regional lineup system, which means the investigators don’t have to leave the ARIES system as they make up their cases.
Figure 24: Six Pack Line-up
Methodology: 1. The user does a query in ARIES for the suspect in their case. 2. ARIES notes the physical characteristics of the suspect in terms of approximate age, race,
height, weight, hair, etc., and establishes that as the baseline. 3. ARIES then selects mugshots from the servers serving the jail and the mugshot repositories
in Contra Costa and Alameda County and returns groups of ten candidates with similar physical characteristics.
4. The detective can select, shuffle, replace, and search further as well as modify the parameters and repeat the search as many times as necessary.
5. When the user is satisfied, they can save the lineup, and ARIES prints out two lineups: a. One to show the witness with the two rows of three mugshots with the numbers 1-6 under
each respective picture. b. One for Records with the names and DOBs underneath each picture and a large bold
message directing them not to show this second page to witnesses.
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STEP 11.0: INSTITUTIONALIZING INTEGRATION? When federal funds are flowing and development teams are hard at work, there is great excitement as each new project and feature is implemented. But recent years have been difficult ones budget wise, at least for the agencies in Contra Costa County. For a few rare times in recent memory, law enforcement agencies have had to shut down vital programs, disband effective programs and special units, and lay off sworn personnel. At the same time, federal funds have enabled ARIES to create vital tools and infrastructure that would never have been possible with state and local resources. How do you carefully build the newly-integrated and shared resources to ensure that they are cost-effective and indispensable, such that they won’t fall victim to the budget cutter’s axe? It would be a shame to have spent all that time, effort, and taxpayer dollars to build a system the agencies rely on, only to disband it because of lack of ongoing support resources. A number of ideas are presented for consideration below:
1. Make sure the systems are EXTREMELY effective in terms of solving cases, collecting solid evidence, and dramatically increasing productivity of the users. The key to this is way back in the “due diligence” phase of the project when one is documenting what serious problems the users are facing that integration can address. In some cases in Contra Costa County, some projects were assumed to be important, but the careful documentation of “The Problem and the Need” revealed that the issues were not that major or that there were simpler or more practical ways to solve the perceived need.
What does extremely effective mean? It means the following:
a. Users can gather much more information in a much shorter period of time, so that they can achieve more in a much shorter period of time. Users report making fewer telephone calls to the jail and to other enforcement agencies to find information and persons of interest. The jail, the Central ID Bureau, and the Records Department report far fewer calls to them for information, and, when people do call them, they remind the caller of the ARIES system and sometimes train them on how to use it over the telephone.
b. Users can find information that they would probably never have found before because
of the number of databases they can hit simultaneously.
c. User convenience is enhanced. Anything that saves steps, removes computer frustration, and is convenient will be heavily supported by users, particularly if it replaces some archaic, multi-step, sometimes unreliable process. There are many features on the old LJIS system in Contra Costa County that were intended for the convenience of the user, but only a few old-timer, high-achievers know how to use them and, out of pride, are willing to persist in using them.
2. Design closely with the users – One would think this is obvious, but it isn’t. Many systems
are designed by people with more systems experience than criminal justice experience. It is important to use subject matter experts in quickly formed ad hoc user groups to (a) tease out of them50 their wish lists of data (b) demonstrate prototypes for feedback, (c) be the early beta testers to provide valuable feedback, (d) to evaluate and recommend improvements after the
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We once held a working group meeting with a few investigators, and we felt like watch salesmen just getting off the boat and flashing the inside of your suit coat with an assortment of watches in trying to tell them what was possible with the probation data we were going to expose for them. After thirty minutes of grunts and blank Orphan Annie looks, the homicide investigator blurted out, “I just want to know if they are on probation and can I search them.” There it was, all we needed to know.
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systems are in production. Long after each component has gone into production, we reconvene selected groups of like users to review the production application and ask for feedback on what they like about the application and what improvements they wish they had. No matter how well you design, the everyday user will soon exceed the developers in their expertise on how the system works. They also will find shortcuts and unintended uses for the system. For instance:
a. A Subpoenaed Witness Management System was developed to let subpoenaed law
enforcement witnesses know as soon as the prosecution had made a decision whether or not they were still needed in court. It would also let a witness see all the cases for which they are to appear in the foreseeable future. The prosecuting attorneys began to use it for an unplanned purpose of seeing what other cases their law enforcement witness is needed for.
b. A citizen charged that someone had revealed that her boyfriend had a criminal record
and she was sure that the husband of a friend (a sworn officer) had run the boyfriend through the state CLETS system. The department contacted CLETS to ask them to check their logs to see if that officer had run that specific name. CLETS said that forms would have to be filled out and it would be a month before they could look into it. Internal Affairs ran it in ARIES which reads the CLETS log and exonerated the officer in six seconds.
3. Focus on Higher Priority Integration Activities – Much of the focus of national integration
efforts have been on labor saving activities like document exchange (to cut down on redundant data entry) and the Justice Integration Exchange Model (JIEM) and Global Justice Exchange Data Model/Data Dictionary (GJXDM/JXDD). These are essentially business reasons of efficiency improvement. But we don’t think employees in the Public Sector leap out of their beds each morning to run to work to find a way to save some time or money. High achievers in the private sector will be rewarded for that but not the public sector51.
Most of the ARIES projects focus on helping investigators solve cases thereby preventing further death and injury in the communities and protecting officers as well. One project saves money by reducing unnecessary overtime pay to law enforcement witnesses, while another contemplates eliminating a lot of wasted effort in the booking process. The rest are focused on rapidly (a) collecting evidence, (b) identifying suspects, and (c) locating suspects. The faster a good case can be put together, the more likely it is that a dangerous person can be taken off the streets.
4. Constantly Evaluate Your Systems – In addition to the “reality therapy” sessions with special
user groups referenced above, we do the following to evaluate how we are doing:
a. Check the new user log to see how many new users have changed their temporary password and are starting to use the system.
b. Check the user logs to see how often and how long users are logged onto the system. c. Evaluate the level of use by each agency to see how pervasively the whole department
is using the system. In the ARIES configuration, some very small departments are using the system way above their proportion of sworn officers or population in the county. Why are they doing that? What benefits drive them to do that when some of the larger departments are not using it as much?
d. Do cross tabs and analyses of use by departments and distribute the findings to the
51
In a previous life, the author worked closely with a huge parcel delivery company, who would expend large amounts of time, energy, and capital on finding ways to save a couple of minutes per day per driver. It did not matter to them that those couple of minutes per driver could not be aggregated for some significant lump sum benefit. The search for efficiency and elimination of steps for the convenience of their drivers and their customers was the Holy Grail.
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management groups from time to time to assure them that the agencies are depending on the system.
e. Do a blind user survey from time to time to gain specific evaluative feedback.
STEP 12.0: PERMANENT FUNDING? When the funding for the first 12 months of the project were exhausted, the project shut down for a month, but restarted in April 2003 with a reallocation of some lawsuit settlement funds in the amount of $200,000 augmented by the pro-rata contributions of the participating agencies based on the formula agreed to by all. This was a significant achievement because the member agency budgets had been severely cut back, so no funds for the project had been budgeted by the local agencies, and many agencies were cutting programs and laying off sworn employees. But through the leadership provided by the Sheriff’s Office and the individual members, each of them scratched up their share, and the project started again. Predictably, some complained about the ratios and wondered aloud why one agency was paying more or less than another. The attitude of the chairman from the Sheriff’s Office was that if they could just maintain momentum and traction by patching together what funding they could, they would be in good shape when better financial times arrived and/or when more federal funds could be obtained. With the local funding, the project was continued and the development team from Hunter Research, Inc. returned to work. Subsequently more federal funding was obtained, and the project continued. This pattern repeated several times over the three year course of the project as funding cycles and project timeframes didn’t coincide, and the project team would be off duty for several months.
Wakeup Call
Against the background of budget cuts, disbanded law enforcement units, laid off sworn officers and the temporary discontinuation of the ARIES project, the users were very aware that we might spend all this time, effort, and funds building a system that could not be maintained with general fund revenues from each agency. This would be a tragedy now that 1,850 users were on the system and many were finding it an indispensable tool. The Chairman of the ARIES Committee appointed a Finance Subcommittee whose sole function was to find on-going funding for the ARIES system after it evolved from a project to part of the institutional fabric. HRI contacted all other known county integration projects in the nation to find out what they had done to secure continuity funding. Interestingly enough, few had considered the issue and were operating on either federal funds, bond issues, or some other source of startup funding. Some acknowledged that they would have to make some contingency plans to keep their newly-formed service in operation. The counties contacted were as follows:
• MARIN COUNTY, CA • KERN COUNTY, CA • ARJIS – SAN DIEGO REGION, CA • MARICOPA COUNTY, AZ • SACRAMENTO COUNTY, CA • KING COUNTY, WA – RAIN • ARROWHEAD REGION – DULUTH, MN • COCONINO COUNTY, AZ
• SAN JOAQUIN COUNTY, CA • STANISLAUS COUNTY, CA • MCCLEAN COUNTY, IL • PALM BEACH COUNTY, FL • MIAMI – DADE COUNTY, FL • ORANGE COUNTY, FL • STATE OF NEVADA
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A report of those findings entitled, Finding Permanent Funding for Integration Programs - After the Federal Grants is available from HRI.
Possible Funding Mechanisms Among the approaches taken to funding criminal justice integration at the county level are the following:
5. Funding is provided directly out of the general fund to the integration project. 6. The County IT department charges each of the individual departments, or in other words, robs
Peter to pay Paul. 7. The County charges the municipalities, federal, and state members an annual fee. 8. The Voters approved a bond issue to build a jail and included a large portion of the bond issue
to build an integrated justice system. 9. The County levies an excise tax on hotel rooms of .22% of the base room charge. 10. The project relies on federal grants for as long as they can be obtained. 11. The project obtained gifts from computer hardware and software firms (Dell and Microsoft) 12. The project uses confiscation money from drug cases. 13. The project is creating a private, non-profit corporation to attract foundation money. 14. A regional group charges the constituent agencies an annual fee based on the number of
sworn officers in each participating agency. They get the officer count from the state POST office.
15. The County is trying to get the more heavy users among the municipalities to pay, although with federal development funds exhausted, the system is at a standstill.
16. The County obtains funding from a State Technology granting agency that focuses upon fingerprint capture stations in all law enforcement agencies and justifies their projects because they are regional in nature.
17. The departments quit paying the County IT their annual chargeback funds ($2 million) for the mainframe support and re-use the funds to start developing her own modern system.
18. The County pays for everything out of general funds and does not charge the municipalities for using their systems.
19. The State courts collect court fees and a portion of those funds are provided the counties to support integration efforts.
20. The County administration funds the system separately from county IT and also provides a portion of court fees.
21. The County charges user fees to the participant agencies. 22. Other types of user fees charged, a portion of which may go to integration projects. 23. Nassau County, NY charges users for access to GIS data over the Internet. 24. Orange County, CA charges $5.00 per criminal information query per name per index plus
additional fees if copies of documents are requested. 25. The state of Florida collects $12.50 for each moving traffic violation to be applied to local law
enforcement automation. 26. The Information Network of Kansas (INK) operates the self-funded Consolidated IT
Management Model and manages 215,000 pages for the state. The network builds service applications and web sites for state agencies and associations at no cost to the agencies. The state portal encompasses all state agencies, regents, and many association web sites and services. More than 90% are free to users. The other 10% collect small transaction fees and the $75 up-front fees and $60 annual subscription fees for access to the Kansas Administration Regulations and other documents provided by INK. The INK model costs the state nothing. Nine years after its creation, Ink’s revenues total more than $7 million a year. Of that, 80%, or $5.6 million, is returned to state agencies.
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Table 12.0: Additional Fees Collected to help Support Integration Projects
Fees Amount
Copies of Incident Reports $25.00 – waived for victim Disturbance – 2nd Response Actual Charges Proof of Citation Correction $15.00 View Own Criminal History $25.00 Background Actual costs Warrant Processing for Other Agencies Actual costs Request for Sealing Records $120.00 Latent Print Services Actual Drunk Driving Emergency Response Actual to $1,000 ROR Screening Fee $25.00 Citation Processing Fee $10.00 Booking Fee – (If Convicted) Actual Costs Handling of Decedents $150.00 Incarceration Fee (Convicted Felons) Unknown State of California (Considering) Probation Fees Incarceration Fees (Housing Costs) Disciplinary Fees – In Facility Pre-Sentence Report Fee
Unknown
CJ Enhancement on Gaming Fees Unknown Parking Ticket Surcharge Unknown Speeding through a Work Zone Fee Unknown Pistol Permit Surcharge – (Retroactive) $107 Restitution Recovery Surcharge 10% of Restitution Amount Subpoenas $50.00 Summons $50.00 Court Citations $50.00 Writ of Restitution $65.00 Outside Agency Subpoena Request $94.00
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USER SURVEY An empirical survey of ARIES was completed in August 2006 and is the second one conducted of ARIES users and was intended to obtain their subjective assessment of the system and to obtain feedback that could not be obtained in any other way. Users have E-mailed anecdotes from time to time relating great experiences of how ARIES helped them, but this survey was a more thorough and empirical way to determine who is using the system, how they are using it, and their assessment of it. The survey was conducted on-line via the Zoomerang.com service. The Uniform Resource Location (URL) address for the survey was E-mailed to 530 users who have used ARIES heavily during the past two months. Over 183 users (35%) of those users responded online and their assessments were automatically analyzed by the Zoomerang service which Hunter Research, Inc. purchased for this purpose. The time savings for HRI of not having to enter user responses and perform statistical analyses were significant. The distribution and response rates are as follows:
Survey Distribution and Response Number Per Cent
Surveys Distributed 530 100% E- Mail (I’m out of the office) automatic responses 11 2% Error in E-mail Address52 – Corrected/Resent 13 2% E-mail Failed to Deliver 20 4% Completed Surveys returned 183 35%
A 35% survey return is huge in survey terms and with the large number of returned surveys it was likely that the sample size while not random can be generalized to all 530 users. Using the F-test Two-Sample for Variances analysis, the F-test score of 1.348 means that one can be 95% certain that the responses of the 183 respondents are not materially different from what would be expected if all 530 persons had completed the survey. The average rating of all ARIES components as being either “Very Good” or “Excellent” was 82%, and while that is exceptionally high for any system, the users were asked to provide specific recommendations for improvements. The ARIES Committee will review these against the existing workplan in their January planning meeting to determine which if any can be worked into the current work year. The survey results and analyses are shown below.
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These addresses were taken from the ARIES tables maintained by the ARIES Coordinator for each agency and when they are not correct, ARIES cannot notify a user of their “lost password” or notify them that their saved search in ARIES has found new information, nor can they receive late breaking bulletins. Therefore correct E-mail addresses are imperative.
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0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
Per Cent 16% 15% 21% 15% 33%
1 Day 2 Days 3 Days 4 Days 5 Days
Days Per Week You use ARIES?
ANALYSIS 69% of users are using the system from 3-5 days per week, which means it has permeated their workspace and operations as a tool they use frequently. If this were stratified for law enforcement users only, the number of days the system is used would likely be higher. Likewise if grouped by job function, the investigator group would probably be grouped at an even higher number of days per week.
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
Per Cent 63% 26% 6% 2% 3%
<1 Hour 1 Hours 2 Hours 3 Hours All Day
Hours Per Day You use ARIES?
ANALYSIS It appears that majority of users are using ARIES to search quickly for data, but they are not using it all day. The exception would be investigators and some records clerks who spend hours searching for information. 37% of the users use the system for one or more hours per day.
ARIES Impact on Productivity
The following set of questions is aimed at learning what savings in time (if any) has ARIES provided for the users. Policy makers want to know the cost/benefit of systems they fund and support, and these questions try in an unscientific53 way to quantify that from a user’s perspective. There are benefits to the users if they perceive that ARIES helps them be more productive, even if is difficult to prove empirically. The original intent of ARIES was to aggregate information from among the disparate databases to reduce the number telephone calls, faxes, and E-mails seeking information and to increase the number of cases solved because of readily available information that could not have been found by traditional means. It would be possible to make fairly scientific observations of the costs and benefits from these activities alone from these data received, but while it would be interesting, it would not necessarily identify any funds that could be reallocated.
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These responses are user’s subjective answers, not ones verified by time and motion studies
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0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Per Cent 43% 9% 12% 13% 4% 6% 13%
None1
Call
2
Calls
3
Calls
4
Calls
5
Calls
5
Plus
Fewer OUTBOUND Calls, Faxes?
ANALYSIS 36% of the ARIES users say they are making 3 to 5 Plus fewer outbound calls, faxes or E-mails (per week) in seeking information, because they are able to find what they need in ARIES. The value of that time could be estimated by taking the number of users and the cost of their labor to make the calls, faxes and E-mails. User Comments:
• ARIES saves at least 5 calls • At least 15 fewer outbound phone
calls. • Fewer calls related to subpoenas • Can’t quantify; ARIES is invaluable
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
Per Cent 66% 8% 9% 8% 1% 2% 6%
None 1 2 3 4 5 5+
Fewer INBOUND Calls, Faxes?
ANALYSIS 35% of ARIES users are receiving fewer calls, faxes and E-mails per week, presumably because potential callers are getting information from ARIES. Users at the Jail, Records, and Central ID report fewer incoming calls and refer frequent callers to the ARIES system. User Comments:
• Varies – as little as one, to 5 or more • Don’t receive as many DA calls • 10-15 calls.
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
Per Cent 18% 15% 19% 20% 13% 5% 4% 6%
None <1 1 2 3 4 5 5+
Hrs/Week ARIES has Saved IDENTIFYING Persons?
ANALYSIS: 67% of the respondents indicate that they save an hour or more each day with ARIES in IDENTIFYING individuals. If one were to extrapolate that to all the 530 active users of ARIES times their salary plus employee benefits, the time savings would be very significant. If one assumed that the “less than 1 hour” was a half hour and the “more than 5 hours” response was only 6.0 hours, then the accumulated savings54 for one year would be $1,446,146. This is not “found money” and can’t be reallocated for some other purpose, but it is significant.
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Assume a blended payroll cost of clerical staff and investigators of only $30 per hour (including benefits)
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0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
Per Cent 16% 19% 18% 16% 14% 4% 2% 10%
None <1 1 2 3 4 5 5+
Hrs/Week ARIES has Saved LOCATING Persons?
ANALYSIS: 65% of the respondents indicate that they save an hour or more each day with ARIES in LOCATING individuals. Again if one were to extrapolate that to the 530 heavy users of ARIES times their salary, the time savings would be very significant at approximately $1,516,106 annually in the value of the time saved.
Evaluation of ARIES Data Sources
These questions were aimed at assessing how valuable the various sources of data accessible in ARIES are to the user. Modules begin in ARIES Committee deliberations as a “good idea” or theory that a data source would be good to put in ARIES. The project team then performs the following steps in due diligence to determine how feasible the suggested new service might be:
1. See how agencies are operating today (Work flow), 2. Identify where opportunities exist (if any) to greatly improve productivity in the work flow, 3. Pull needs and requirements from a workgroup of intended users, 4. Develop an ARIES prototype to review with the workgroup, 5. Put into Beta Testing and finally 6. Cut the new service over into production.
It is not a given that every project will be successful. In fact in the initial research phase, some projects are discontinued, because (a) the underlying assumptions were not accurate, (b) another agency is already planning or providing the service, or (c) the estimated costs are way higher than the estimated benefits. The following sections present the evaluation of the users of each module within ARIES. They were given a range of alternative responses aimed at quantifying what percentage of them felt a data source was “Poor”, “Fair”, “Average”, “Very Good” or “Excellent.” User responses of “Don’t Use” were deducted from the denominator for calculation since their opinions are of little value. For most of those responses, the user’s specific job assignment would not require them to seek that particular type of information. For instance, the court techs would not likely need to perform six pack lineups, so they marked that they “Don’t Use” that module. In too many cases, users may not use a function because they are not aware of it or how it could assist them. This is a challenge of communication and training that the ARIES project continues to address.
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Alameda County Arrest & Booking Data
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Per Cent 2% 6% 15% 43% 34%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
ALAMEDA COUNTY DATA: How Valuable Is IT?
ANALYSIS 77% of the users judged the Alameda County data ARIES accesses today as Very Good or Excellent. The data currently available are arrest and booking data and mugshots. Discussions are underway to get more data if possible on probation, RMS records, and protective orders. (See Section “Suggested Improvements” for more comments on Alameda County data)
CLETS/DMV Queries
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Per Cent 2% 4% 13% 37% 43%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
CLETS/DMV QUERIES: How Valuable Is IT?
ANALYSIS 81% of the respondents rated the CLETS/DMV query information as Very Good or Excellent. These data are limited information about which agency and officer ran an individual or license, but do not include any return information from the query. It does let an investigator in one agency call the person that queried CLETS to compare notes.
Probation Status
These data are court records as opposed to data from the Probation Department. They are valuable, because they let officers query on a 7x24 basis to see
(a) If a person is on probation (both formal and bench), (b) What charges they received a probation sentence for, (c) What the terms and conditions of the probation are, such as can they be searched, (d) Whether or not any revocation actions have been started against them (e) When their next court date is (if any), and (f) The date and time the current information was entered.
75
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Per Cent 1% 5% 12% 27% 56%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
PROBATION DATA: How Valuable Is IT?
ANALYSIS 84% of the respondents rated the Court’s Probation Data as Very Good or Excellent User Comments:
• The on-line access to probation information has been very valuable and a big time saver, especially after hours.
• I am able to find out probation information without having to call probation
California DOJ Certified ID Data
These data are downloaded every 15 minutes from the DOJ system which collects all agency notifications from Livescan mnemonics emanating from within Contra Costa County. When a person’s prints are collected in any agency in the county, they are forwarded to the DOJ for identification. Within approximately 2.0 hours, the DOJ sends an Agency Notification message identifying the individual or issuing a new AFIS and SID number. The DOJ saves a copy of that notification in a separate file, which ARIES parses and adds to a database with six (6) years of agency notifications. The notifications provide valuable information such as the following:
1. All known AKAs submitted by any agency in the past for this person 2. All known Social Security Numbers known to have been used by that person 3. All known driver’s license numbers used by the person 4. Whether or not the person is a Sex, Arson, Gang, or Drug Registrant 5. Last known address and phone number of the individual 6. Whether or not good DNA evidence is on file at DOJ or whether or not it should be collected
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
Per Cent 1% 10% 22% 34% 33%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
DOJ Certified ID Data: How Valuable Is IT?
ANALYSIS Only 69% rated this module as Very Good or Excellent. This suggests that in our training programs and bulletins we ought to reinforce the value of this resource, because it is the only certified identification source where the state DOJ has certified by AFIS number, State I.D. number, and FBI number that the person’s prints are connected to a specific person.
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Sheriff’s Jail Data
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
Per Cent 0% 1% 2% 26% 71%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
Sheriff’s Jail Data: How Valuable Is IT?
ANALYSIS: The 97% Very Good or Excellent rating confirms the ARIES Committee’s judgment in the beginning that this application should be the first one up and that every agency needed this information.
Mugshots from 48 Agencies
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
Per Cent 0% 0% 2% 21% 76%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
Regional Mugshots: How Valuable Are They?
ANALYSIS: The 97% Very Good or Excellent rating indicates the value of having the mugshots from throughout the county as well as for Alameda County. User Comments
Photos---big help, here at EHSD we don't get a lot of info. DMV takes too long to get photos so this is really helpful to us.
Mugshots are great, identifying subjects who have no ID during field contact by their ARIES photo
Protective Orders
These orders of all types are couriered from the courthouse to the Records Division of the Sheriff’s Office where they are keyed into the Sheriff’s RMS system, uploaded to CLETS as required, and scanned into a document database, where ARIES can retrieve and display the actual orders on screen for the user. The user can enter a name and ARIES will retrieve it regardless of whether or not the name searched is the restrained person or the protected person.
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0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Per Cent 1% 2% 21% 29% 47%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
Protective Orders: How Valuable Are They?
ANALYSIS: The 76% Very Good or Excellent rating justifies the time and expense of the Sheriff’s Office in entering the data from all protective orders and proofs of services from the court as well as their effort to scan in the protective orders which ARIES displays for the user. User Comments
The access and printable TRO's are phenomenal, and save a huge amount of time and headaches trying to obtain them!
Records Management Systems
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Per Cent 1% 2% 16% 34% 47%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
Records Mgmt. Data: How Valuable is it?
ANALYSIS: This was the first objective of the law enforcement community which preceded ARIES by many years, when they sought a master name index. ARIES has grown from that modest objective, and the 81% Very Good or Excellent score suggests that the majority appreciate this capability, wherein ARIES reads nine (9) different records management systems in the county plus Alameda County’s arrest and booking data.
Witness & Subpoena System
This system provides the latest information on the status of subpoenas and witness appearance requirements from the District Attorney’s office for law enforcement agency witnesses. It replaces faxes, most phone calls, and a recorded message that agencies used to call to see if their officer’s presence was still required in court. The data are read from the County’s LJIS system on the mainframe and are made queryable for ARIES users in all law enforcement agencies in the county. The primary users of this system are the respective subpoena clerks of the various agencies. The county IT staff take the mainframe down for maintenance or various purposes and forget to restart the ARIES job, even though it has been given a high priority number in their system. It is the one part of ARIES that ever goes down and is a source of frustration to the clerks. However the service from the County IT department has improved greatly, recently.
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0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
Per Cent 1% 11% 21% 32% 35%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
Witness & Subpoena Data: How Valuable is it?
ANALYSIS: This information is provided to assist subpoena clerks and officers to know the current status of their subpoenas in each case, and 67% give it a favorable rating. User Comment • I like that in the subpoena activity, you
can sort by different columns, which is helpful based on what you are trying to view.
Six-Pack & Large Photo Lineup System
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
Per Cent 0% 1% 8% 24% 66%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
Six Pack Lineups: How Valuable are They?
ANALYSIS: This was an application that the development team was a little reluctant to build because each agency has lineup capabilities in their own RMS system as well as with CalPhoto. However a 92% rating of Good or Excellent confirms the judgment of the users who state that it is much more convenient and provides a broader universe of photos and subjects to choose from. User Comment The greatest help to me has been the ability to access photos from other agencies in order to identify persons. The photo line-up feature has been great, especially for photos from Alameda County that we never used to have access to.
AutoPilot Repeatable Searches
This system enables a user to select the data sources they wish and to initiate a search, then save it, and instruct ARIES on how frequently the search should be repeated. ARIES uses that search as a baseline and using mathematic formulas creates a pattern of the returned data. It reruns the search in the frequency specified by the user, and then checks the mathematical pattern of the new search versus the baseline search. When the patterns differ, ARIES notifies the user by E-mail (if the user has previously entered it into ARIES accurately) or with a message the next time the user logs on to ARIES that there is new information on their search. The new information is then highlighted for the user.
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0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Per Cent 0% 4% 19% 32% 45%
Poor Fair Avg.Very
GoodExcellent
AutoPilot Repeatable Searches: How Valuable?
ANALYSIS: 77% of users that use this module rated it as Very Good or Excellent.
LIFE WITHOUT ARIES?
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
100%
120%
Per Cent 2% 98%
Yes Absolutely Not
Want to Go Back to Life Without ARIES?
ANALYSIS: The 98% response clearly indicates that users depend on the system to perform their duties and would not want to return to the days when they ARIES was not available.
Overall Impact of ARIES
These questions were aimed at assessing specific ways in which ARIES impacts the users in the performance of their work. Earlier questions above on productivity asked specific questions about the impact on incoming and outbound telephone calls, faxes, and E-mails. The following questions seek broader feedback on this subject.
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0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
Per Cent 3% 10% 13% 14% 28% 33%
NoneLittle More
Done
Lot More
Done
Little More
Effective
Lot More
Effective
Saves a
Lot of
Time
What Impact has ARIES Had on Your Job?
ANALYSIS
• 22% get a little to a lot more done • 43% say ARIES helps them be a little to
a lot more effective in their work. • 33% indicated it saves a lot of time ADDITIONAL USER COMMENTS:
• It saves time and increases efficiency • Aries saves me time and is a very
effective tool • Greatest asset in finding new arrests
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
Per Cent 2% 43% 45% 66% 68% 65%
None More Data
Data Not
found
Elsewhere
Points to
Other
Agencies
Reduces
Calls
Better
Data
How Does ARIES Help You?
ANALYSIS These ways in which ARIES helps the user are the ones that were in the original charter for ARIES as laid out by the founding committee that preceded ARIES. These high percentage responses (multiple choice question) suggest that ARIES is meeting these goals to a fairly high degree.
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Per Cent 0% 3% 42% 55%
Difficult Complicated Pretty Easy Very Easy
How Easy is ARIES to Learn?
ANALYSIS: 97% say that ARIES is pretty easy to very easy to learn. That is a significant goal of every application to be effective and simple to master. This also relates to the amount of formal training required to master ARIES. (See below)
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0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Per Cent 2% 48% 37% 14%
Poor Helpful Very Helpful Learn Myself
How Do You Rate the Training?
ANALYSIS: 86% said the training was helpful or very helpful and 14% said it was easy enough to learn by themselves. This response plus the one above on the ease of learning ARIES suggests that even though it is simple to master, the formal, hands on, classroom training is effective. The training does focus on some capabilities that may not be obvious when one teaches oneself.
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
Per Cent 68% 0% 16% 2% 1% 2% 2% 9%
None Difficult Slow DownPoor
Help
Poor
Commu
nicatio
Too
Much
Data
Too
Little
Data
Weaknesses of ARIES?
ANALYSIS The rating of 68% saying “None” is significant. Increasing the speed of the application is a continual goal of the project as is finding more and better data, especially from Alameda and other counties as ARIES continues to evolve. The project has focused on connecting to the desired databases and has not yet taken the time to optimize in the performance arena as will be possible in the future.
ARIES User Comments
I usually run 30-40 persons every week and have found the jail information from ARIES very
useful. The subject's arrest record, date of release, etc., is on file immediately - no waiting for days and days to get the information. I can quickly clear my subjects and finish this particular task. Previously, I had to call the sheriff and follow up with a fax that could take to 2 - 5 days to get a response.
As Deputy Chief in charge of Administration and Investigations, I sometimes assist with cases when Detectives are on overload. I have used AIRES to identify suspects in major identity theft cases and followed up these cases with Probation Searches. I have utilized the six packs and I have found the system quite easy to use. Dwight Hunter and his team have done an excellent job with this system and I know that the system is extremely beneficial to Investigators and patrol officers, and even the Administrator who from time to time may utilize the system.
The greatest help to me has been the ability to access photos from other agencies in order to identify suspects. The photo line-up feature has been great, especially for photos from Alameda County that we never used to have access to. The on-line access to probation information has been very valuable and a big time saver, especially after hours. ARIES has definitely made my job easier with the wealth of information that I can access from one source.
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Saving time from having to call other agencies to see if they have contacted a particular person is the best. I once had a person of interest in a 459 that I was able to find had been contacted by El Cerrito PD through ARIES which I would not have been able to find in ANY other way....
I have helped officers identify several different people by looking up photos and info and giving
them the description and tattoo info. I have also made photo line-ups for the officers that have led to a witness or victim being able to ID the suspect, and in some cases the suspect was arrested much faster.
I was looking for a suspect whose identity I didn't know. I used ARIES by inputting the license
plate of the vehicle the suspect was driving. He was not the owner, but had been arrested by Oakley PD two days prior to my inquiry. I was able to ID all involved parties (3 suspects). I investigated the case and got a felony filing on all three. Without ARIES, this case easily could have gone unsolved. I am a dedicated and firm believer in ARIES.
CCSO homicide detectives came to my agency looking for records info on a victim that was
found stabbed to death. When I ran him through ARIES I was able to supply them with the last time the subject was run thru CLETS, the city he was in when he was run, the people he was with, and the officer who ran him. This provided vital information to the detectives and it pointed them in the direction of the subject’s known associates, who he was with the day prior to his death, and where he was the day before he was killed.
Conclusion:
This survey exceeded any expectations of the project team both in terms of the number of responses from the ARIES users and their favorable evaluation of ARIES1. Their suggestions for improvement are excellent and reflect how the application can be fine-tuned to help them save steps and to be more effective in their vital jobs.
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A MAP OF THE ARIES WEB APPLICATION A map of the ARIES Web Services application is shown below and documents all the databases it reads today. It continues to be a work in progress with users or the development staff coming up with good ideas for tweaking the existing system as well as new applications.
Figure 25: A Map of the ARIES Web Services Application
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Summary and Lessons Learned The ARIES project has been developed more or less steadily over the past three years from a focus on identifying common data needs among the agencies to a full blown, multi-faceted production system upon which the agencies and users rely.
1. Leadership is Critical - For a local, multi-agency effort to move forward, leadership must be provided by a large, respected justice agency, and the leadership must permeate vertically and horizontally through the agency. While the sheriff laid out the policy and his goal for integration and sharing of data, his commanders, captains, lieutenants, IT support, and purchasing staff followed through aggressively. Multi-agency efforts may have MOUs and other structures in place, but their success depends on the fragile commitments and balance of power and respect among the agencies to continue. The balance can change quickly with addition or subtraction of persons with dissenting views. Interestingly enough, nearly all the original leaders that started the ARIES project have retired or have been assigned to other duties. Yet so far their legacy remains in place and the excitement and momentum continues.
Leadership must be continually applied to reinforce commitments to a development ideal, especially when budgets are tight or politics raises its head. For instance at crucial meetings of the JAAC policy committee the Sheriff would attend personally rather than sending a representative, this reaffirming his support for the project. At meetings with the Chiefs of Police, he would attend and urge them onward or state, “See, this is what we can accomplish when we all work together on something.” When a neighboring county was dragging their feet in sharing their data, the Sheriff contacted their Sheriff directly and through subordinates to lobby for their faster cooperation.
2. The Times in Which We Live - Two key impetuses to the success of the project were (a) the
911 disaster which added a new threat to provincialism among justice agencies, namely the possibility of well-organized and well-funded terrorists and groups bent on crime as opposed to individuals or gangs and (b) the commitment to enable local agencies to participate and to be represented at all committee levels, plus (c) the commitment to give them veto power over data they might not want to share.
3. The Importance of Federal Funding - Federal funding is indispensable in launching efforts of
this type. Even in the best of budget times, it is highly unlikely that if all local governments pooled their money that they could come up with the amount needed, especially over multiple budget years, to fund an effort of this magnitude.
4. Continuity of Federal Funding - Sequentially lining up federal grants is a challenge yet must
be planned for to provide continuity in the project. There were three times in the first three years where the project team was off duty (though not entirely) because extensions or project approval paperwork did not get submitted in time, or federal grants were very slow in filtering down to the county. Part of the project management duties must be spent worrying about schedules and matching development progress with the receipt of funding and working backwards from key meetings to prepare paperwork and gain approvals at the lower levels.
5. Some Vendors are Holding Back the Process - Vendors of criminal justice software are
very paranoid about the sharing process, particularly in revealing anything about the structure of their systems, because of their fear of exposing their trade secrets or “terms of art” to others. Some vendors were very cooperative, but most were not and while they would make promises and talk a good game, some never did provide the information requested of them. A few vendors wanted to be paid for modifications to their programs that would greatly benefit them with their other existing or potential customers.
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Vendors are rightfully nervous about another system accessing their production systems for fear of slowdowns in throughput or corruption of their systems. This was generally overcome with replication of data systems to a second server, which the project could access and optimize for faster response times.
6. Maintaining Momentum - Maintaining momentum is crucial to making rapid progress. At the
conclusion of each ARIES Committee meeting, the project team lays out what deliverables, demonstrations, or products they are going to present at the next monthly meeting. The intent is to assure the members that steady effective progress is being made. The team establishes specific goals plus creates a list of extra credit achievements they would have to stretch for to add to the excitement of the meetings.
7. The Tower of Babble in the Market Place - Change in technology continues at a dizzying
pace, but it is not a linear process in terms of MHz and GHz increases that impact integration the most. The changes that impact integration are among the vendors of middleware and databases that continue to rename, remarket, retarget, and make up new acronyms and marketing slogans to attract new business. The mergers and acquisition of companies leaves the consumer confused over what technologies they should embrace. BEA, IBM, Sun and Microsoft have made many strategic purchases as they joust for market share and position. Who can define and distinguish the following terms when considering alternative products and vendors as a platform for integration?
Table 13.0: Middleware Terms and Definitions
Middleware Term Acronym Definition Application Integration Middleware
AIM Screen Scraping55 – Projecting old legacy data within the Web Page Database Gateways56 – Connecting different databases on different platforms.
Application Server Software ASS Also called an appserver. A program that handles all application operations between users and an organization's backend business applications or databases57.
Business Process Management
BPM Tools that break down the business processes of an enterprise to reveal wasted activities that can be re-engineered to obtain more benefits. They involve automating the flow of work between people and applications or integrating disparate systems for better data exchange.
Component Oriented J2EE .NET
Using and re-using components independent of the higher level applications in which they operate.
Customer Relations Management
CRM Enterprise-wide software applications that allow companies to manage every aspect of their relationship with a customer. The aim of these systems is to assist in building
55 Data that would have gone to the legacy terminal screen is re-directed to a web-based application and is displayed in that new environment with new
functionality.
56 Database gateways have the following functions: (1) accept statements specified by a well-defined grammar (usually SQL) from a client application, (2)
translate the statements to a specific database format, (3) send the statements to be executed against the database, (4) translate the results back into a well-
defined format, and (5) return the data and status information to the client.
57 Application servers are typically used for complex transaction-based applications. To support high-end needs, an application server has to have built-in
redundancy, monitors for high-availability, high-performance distributed application services, and support for complex database access.
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Middleware Term Acronym Definition
lasting customer relationships - to turn customer satisfaction into customer loyalty58.
Enterprise Application Integration
EAI An enterprise-wide amalgamation of
communications/messaging, XML, data
transformation, brokers, process models
and development frameworks59.
Enterprise Requirements Planning
ERP A business management system that integrates all facets of the business, including planning, manufacturing, sales, and marketing. As the ERP methodology has become more popular, software applications have emerged to help business managers implement ERP in business activities such as inventory control, order tracking, customer service, finance, and human resources.
Enterprise Service Bus ESB ESB is a term invented by market analyst Gartner Group to refer to a pipe that was particularly well suited to handling Web services traffic. But ESBs are more than just plumbing on which XML payloads with SOAP wrappers can run. The enterprise service bus aims to provide a standards-based messaging bus—based on JMS—in conjunction with standards-based connectors—the J2EE Connector Architecture (frequently abbreviated to JCA).
Extract, Transform and Load ETL First, the extract function reads data from a specified source database and extracts a desired subset of data. Next, the transform function works with the acquired data - using rules or lookup tables, or creating combinations with other data - to convert it to the desired state. Finally, the load function is used to write the resulting data (either all of the subset or just the changes) to a target database, which may or may not previously exist.
Message Oriented Middleware MOM One application can “publish” information and a receiving application can “subscribe” to receive it. (You’ve Got Mail!)60
58 Customer information acquired from sales, marketing, customer service, and support is captured and stored in a centralized database. The system may provide data-mining
facilities that support an opportunity management system. It may also be integrated with other systems, such as accounting and manufacturing, for a truly enterprise-wide
system with thousands of users. 59 EAI (Enterprise Application Integration) is a business computing term for the plans, methods, and tools aimed at modernizing, consolidating, and coordinating
the computer applications in an enterprise. Typically, an enterprise has existing legacy applications and databases and wants to continue to use them while
adding or migrating to a new set of applications that exploit the Internet, e-commerce, extranet, and other new technologies. EAI may involve developing a new
total view of an enterprise's business and its applications, seeing how existing applications fit into the new view, and then devising ways to efficiently reuse what
already exists while adding new applications and data.
60 IBM's MQSeries is a prime example of such a product.
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Middleware Term Acronym Definition Mobile Middleware MM Software that extends the desktop
applications out to the handheld device Object Oriented CORBA
ORB Descriptions of object-oriented process interactions over a network. This technology is older and is diminishing at this time.
Service Oriented Architecture SOA A service-oriented architecture (SOA) defines how two computing entities interact in such a way as to enable one entity to perform a unit of work on behalf of another entity61.
Web Based Middleware WBW Web-based browsers are common-place in most organizations and is the standard, if not the only, means of user interface62.
It should be clear by now that middleware might be called muddleware because the terms and acronyms thrown about loosely in the trade literature is confusing rather than enlightening and the distinctions made above are not sufficiently distinct to help agencies make good software decisions.
8. Lack of Objective, Evaluative Information on Middleware - There is a lack of good
available and affordable evaluative data on the various middleware products. One can find puff pieces and “Gee Whiz” reviews from the trade magazines, but finding definitive and comparative information on the relative merits of each of the very expensive products is virtually impossible. Research organizations provide tempting report outlines or tables of contents on the web of documents purporting to provide valuable information, but these are usually very expensive, very shallow, and a purchaser cannot readily ascertain what each of the products can do. The Gee Whiz reviews are about the look and feel and potential of a product, and the reviews are loaded with buzzwords but little practical information that would assist a potential buyer in making a confident and intelligent decision. What system integrators, value added resellers, and large end users would benefit from are the following:
a. Fully describe the product and all its modules b. Describe what type of project they are suited for c. Explain in detailed technical terms how they work d. Walk through a specific implementation project where the writer has actually used the
product63 and explain how the product performed. Then the reader can relate that the project is similar to one they are contemplating and the product does in whole or in part what they need to do
e. Explain the cost basis of the product (CPUs, named users, concurrent users, site licenses, etc) so the potential buyer knows if it is affordable or if the cost is the size of the national defense budget.
f. Contrast the product with other products, like Websphere, or BizTalk, or Sonic, or...
61 The unit of work is referred to as a service, and the service interactions are defined using a description language. Each interaction is self-contained and loosely coupled,
so that each interaction is independent of any other interaction.
62 Most are using XML which is a language that defines a syntax and document organization for data, both containing human and machine-readable tag/value pairs. Many
of the application integration middleware products use XML as the data exchange protocol and, in the B2B space, XML will be the dominant method of data exchange in the
future, eventually replacing electronic data interchange (EDI). Web-based middleware is quickly evolving from its emerging new technology status, into a mainstream,
complete application framework.
63 Maybe marketers don’t understand that a potential buyer is looking to solve specific problems and purchasing
a very expensive tool with a steep learning curve is not a trivial decision. Careers can be retained or lost based on those decisions.
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One can do a detailed search on the Internet for evaluative data and find reports in the range of $2,500 - $7,500 to much higher and a succulent table of contents, but who can afford to buy these file jobs and who is willing to purchase them with the risk of coming away hungry and unsatisfied? How focused are the reports on what you want to see? Do you just want to see an estimated market share or gross sales estimates ten years into the future? Those data are fine, but what one hungers for is detailed information about how the product works, what it does precisely, and is it the product I need and can afford and risk my career on. How difficult will it be for us to learn and master? Those are the data that would satisfy the user and close the long chronological gap between interest in a product and a purchase order.
9. Some Counties are trapped in Old Integrated, Mainframe Systems - In every integration
project HRI has been involved with, the analysis of what criminal justice data needs to be shared constitutes about 10% of the substance and procedures of the criminal justice agencies. The other 90% is all about operating each department in a productive manner. In one large County the departments were all serviced by a horribly bloated IT department on a so called integrated system built in 1970. Each agency had a module on the 35-year old mainframe program. Yet newly-arrived clients came from court with a pink sentencing form granting them probation and waited while a clerk checked an old library card file to see if they were a frequent flyer. Later, at case assignment, an assignment officer checked a huge, foldout accounting ledger to see which POs had room in their caseload for a new client.
Because the departments were in such need of information system support, we installed a new probation system and a new prosecution system and went out to bid for a new public defender system. The courts couldn’t find a best of breed and now are mired between a half-installed new system and the system the state AOC is trying to roll out.
It didn’t make sense to integrate basically 1960 capable systems in that county. It was more prudent to bring in good case management systems for each department that are built on industry-friendly databases so that information can be pushed and pulled among systems for those few electronic data streams that need to be extracted from system A and input into systems B, C, and D. In Tuolumne County our long term integration plan called for the unusual step of replacing all the departmental case management systems with the “best of breed” packages so that they would have the automated support they need to run their departments effectively. Then the 10% of the information needing to be shared among the departments can be integrated in a Web Services type application that cuts across each agency. Accordingly we have installed a CAD/RMS system, a jail system, a court system, a prosecution system, a public defender systems and a probation package all based on modern, relational databases.
10. National Standards – There is a tremendous amount of activity in various organizations attempting to establish standards for integration and while noteworthy in concept some of the standards can spin off into academic arenas that are not very practical. The ARIES XML formats were loosely patterned after the first version of Justice XML which have continued to evolve, and with a system in production, we cannot retrofit backwards to stay current with each subsequent version. Further the name of the data elements are so verbose because they are being named in a convention that tries to incorporate the data, and the time and place in which it was captured. So in ARIES, HRI uses the configurator with a cross reference table where we can use a much shorter field name which is cross referenced to the verbose name given by the standards setting groups. To achieve penetration in the operational systems, these standards need to be grounded in the practical world by folks who must build and maintain systems for satisfied customers rather than the academics who don’t have to.
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Recently one of our clients wanted some data extracted from a Motorola jail system and dumped daily to the District Attorney’s Constellation system and insisted that in their short nanosecond ride from one system to the other, the data elements had to be in the Global Justice XML format. Why? So the client could say that they were in conformance with the version 2.0 of that emerging exercise. We watch the evolution of the standards and try to adhere to the spirit of them since they are evolving but in the meantime we have to develop error free production systems. At a later date when the standards are stable, perhaps we can revisit compatibility issue and adjust.
11. Listen Closely to the Users – Before you begin to design and build systems, make sure you
have documented and know how the current system works and why it is designed that way. It may not be profound, but it is the devil the users know. It may have evolved over time by a series of actors that are no longer on the stage64, but it is how they currently operate. There are usually a lot of procedures and workarounds they have built up to get the job done.
After learning how they now function, you need to tease out of them what functions they wish they had. And you can’t ask them directly because your questions are from a completely different perspective than that of their daily operations. You have to probe and suggest and relate what other agencies are doing to see if you can begin to shape some requirements that the users think they would like. Then you need to prototype systems and demonstrations to show them in reality what they related to you in theory. Once they see the real world, then their comments and suggestions will flow because you have listened well enough to understand what they are trying to do in their jobs. You may have to do this several times before you are ready for production. In the process they will become excited because they helped shape an application that does what they need, rather than one thrown over the transom.
12. Just Do It – Nike didn’t have a bad slogan. Nothing will create more excitement and participation than rapidly building useful applications that greatly help the intended client. On the web site of a consultant who tries to peddle project management processes rather than building anything is the remarkable concept “that one must go through a convoluted set of steps and procedures in implementing an integration project to guard against impetuously implementing the wrong things”. This is a consulting firm that has pontificated on methods and mission statements for over three years in a notable city by the bay and has implemented nothing to date.
Somewhere between the two opposing approaches of (a) theoretical autopsies of the “perfect processes of centralized planning” and (b) “the art of muddling through” lies the ground in which strong foundations are laid, leadership is applied, and momentum is achieved. This describes the processes achieved to date in Contra Costa County which began three years ago with the modest objectives of identifying commonalities of criminal justice data desired by the justice agencies. Today it is a growing, robust system with over 1,850 users with many more cases being solved, and citizens and officers being better protected.
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In doing one workflow the procedures called for dropping a greenbar report into a cardboard box on the floor by Madge’s desk. Both Madge and the box were long since gone when we updated the workflow.
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