HomeMy WebLinkAbout2.f. Police Departmet Records Management UpgradeEXECUTIVE SUMMARY
City Council Work Session: February 9, 2015
AGENDA ITEM: Police Department Records
Management System Upgrade
AGENDA SECTION:
Discussion
PREPARED BY: Mitchell Scott, Chief of Police AGENDA NO. 2.f.
ATTACHMENTS: 08/20/13 Staff Report from City Council
Meeting; Memorandum dated 01/28/15
by Jean Driscoll, Records Supervisor
APPROVED BY: ddj
RECOMMENDED ACTION: Discuss the possible upgrade of the Rosemount Police
Department’s records management system from ProPhoenix RMS to TriTech Software
Systems.
BACKGROUND
In August, 2013, the City Council approved a Joint Powers Agreement between Dakota County and
the City of Rosemount to change record management systems from LOGIS Motorola Record
Management System Infotrak to the ProPhoenix Record Management System (RMS) managed by
the Criminal Justice Information Integration Network (CJIIN). Several other agencies in Dakota
County participated in the Joint Dakota County Law Enforcement Agency Records Management
System including Farmington, Burnsville, Inver Grove Heights and Hastings. The ProPhoenix RMS
was said to save money and provide increased functionality over the Department’s current system.
However, over the past year, feedback from both staff and officers who use the system on a daily
basis reports that the ProPhoenix RMS is not as efficient as it originally appeared to be.
DISCUSSION
An efficient records management system is crucial to the functionality of the Police Department and
the Officers within that Department. The Rosemount Police Department converted the records
systems in November, 2013, to ProPhoenix RMS anticipating a more user friendly and efficient
record keeping system. The Department has used the ProPhoenix for over a year now and has
found the system has several shortcomings and inefficiencies.
TriTech Software Systems released a records management system in 2014 which both the Apple
Valley and Eagan agencies are converting to in 2015. TriTech also provides a computer aided
dispatch (CAD) system which the Dakota County Communications Center (DCC) upgraded to in
2014. At my request, Police Department Records Supervisor, Jean Driscoll, attended a
demonstration of the TriTech records product and provided an explanation of the disadvantages
1
and difficulties of ProPhoenix and how the task would be handled differently by the TriTech
system. Her memorandum setting forth those comparisons is attached for your reference. In
summary, several tasks that are completed on a daily basis by the records staff and officers are
cumbersome and difficult using the ProPhoenix system taking possibly several hours more than with
the TriTech system. Forms are created within ProPhoenix by CJIIN and are created for all agencies
alike, with minimum customization. TriTech has totally customizable forms created by the actual
Police Department, depending on their needs. In addition, statistical reporting, which is important
for police agencies and requested often, is close to impossible through ProPhoenix due to software
difficulties that CJIIN is still working on solving.
Converting to TriTech would allow compatibility between our record management system and the
DCC CAD system.
With regards to annual cost comparisons between the two systems, the two systems are similar in
price. In 2015, we budgeted $41,000 for ProPhoenix but expect a minimum 4% increase in 2016 for
an estimated cost of $43,100.
The one time buy in cost for TriTech would be $77,572 which includes all necessary licenses, system
hardware, implementation, training and interfaces. This cost can be split over five years, interest
free. With TriTech, we would have a superior product for close to the same annual fee.
ProPhoenix (2015) TriTech (2016)
Annual Fee $43,100 $49,000
APS (Ticket Writer) Maintenance Fee $3,700 Included in Annual Fee
LOGIS Fees/Development $3,200 Waived for 2 years
Total Annual Fee $50,000 $49,000
The startup cost for TriTech is approximately an additional $15,500 a year for the first five years.
However, if you take the average salary, plus benefits ($26.50/hr x 1.3), of one of the Records Clerks
who will be working with the system multiplied by the net number of minutes saved per week per
Jean’s memo in items 1-4 (57+30+490+150=727 minutes) and multiply that by 52 weeks, you could
save potentially $21,705 per year using a more efficient system, which more than offsets the $15,500
additional cost. This is a conservative estimate of the savings since this example uses the low end
estimates from Jean’s memo. There are also potential additional cost savings for items 5-8, which
are not quantified.
The Joint Powers Agreement entered into in August, 2013, prohibits the City of Rosemount to
withdraw from the Agreement for a period of three (3) years from the date of the Agreement.
However, the Agreement has been reviewed by City Attorney Tietjen to determine whether or not
the City can withdraw from the Agreement earlier than the termination date. City Attorney Tietjen
believes the request can be made to the DCLEA board to leave the JPA early.
SUMMARY
Staff is requesting Council feedback and discussion on the possibility of upgrading the Police
Department’s Record Management System from ProPhoenix RMS to TriTech Software Systems.
2
MEMORANDUM
TO: Chief Mitchell Scott
FROM: Jean Driscoll, Records Supervisor
SUBJECT: ProPhoenix/TriTech Comparison
DATE: January 28, 2015
As you requested, I attended a demonstration of the “TriTech” records product that is being offered by
LOGIS. The following is a comparison between our current records management system, “ProPhoenix”,
and the new TriTech records product:
1) Deletions (approximately 6 per week): In ProPhoenix there are certain items that cannot be
deleted by records staff; we need to contact CJIIN and ask them to do it. (10 minutes per deletion;
60 minutes total)
With TriTech, Records staff can delete the information without having to contact anyone else. (30
seconds per deletion; 3 minutes total)
2) Entering stolen property (approximately 6 cases per week): In ProPhoenix this process is way more
complicated than it needs to be because it ties stolen property to an offense. That is fine until you
need to make changes to the stolen property (increased value, decreased value, removing it as
stolen, etc.) For example, let’s say that the value of stolen property for an item has now increased
significantly. The increase now makes the offense that the property is tied to a gross misdemeanor
instead of a misdemeanor. Because the property is tied to the misdemeanor offense, it won’t allow
the value change to occur. We often have to call CJIIN to have them delete the original piece of
stolen property and then we have to re-enter the property with the changed value. Considering that
some of our burglaries have contained 50+ pieces of stolen property, this can take a considerable
amount of time. (10 minutes to 180 minutes per theft depending upon the amount of property to
be entered; 60 minutes to 1080 minutes total)
In TriTech, property is related to the case file. Using the same example above, you would simply
change the value of the property, and possibly the offense level, and then resave it. (5 minutes to
30 minutes per theft depending upon the amount of property to be entered; 30 minutes to 180
minutes total)
3) Searching for Activity by Name (150 searches per week): This is one of the most common activities
Records staff and Officers perform. In ProPhoenix this involves approximately five more steps to
get to the information on that person than it does in TriTech. In ProPhoenix you have to go to the
specific name search screen, type in a name, hit search, select a result, go to the activity tab for that
result and then open up the tab to see the activity. (5 minutes per search; 750 minutes total)
TriTech utilizes a search screen called IQ which is constantly running on the side of any screen you
are in; you just move your cursor over, start typing the name and the results come up. (1 minute per
search; 160 minutes total)
4) Populating ProPhoenix Records from CJIIN eForms (30 per week): In ProPhoenix this step is
currently necessary for Records to perform manually in order to get the info from the field-based
reporting system (eForms) into the Records system. It involves Records approving and pushing each
incident to the Records system and then going in and approving each pushed document. (5 minutes
per push; 150 minutes total)
In TriTech, these steps are unnecessary as Records just builds upon what the Officer started in
TriTech on their mobiles. Additional reports are simply added to the original case file by selecting
the type of report it is. No separate push or approval process is necessary. (0 minutes—no push)
5) Case Management: Case management in ProPhoenix was complicated to set up and, once it is set
up, it is labor-intensive to run. Only two of the eight agencies currently using ProPhoenix (and we
are one of the two) use the case management product offered by ProPhoenix. We currently are
using it but it is cumbersome and often does not perform as we would like it to. One specific issue is
that rejection of reports does not take place the way it should; in some cases the reports are
rejected back to the Records staff person who typed it, not to the Officer who wrote the report.
TriTech’s case management system appeared to be fairly simple to use. Although I didn’t get a
thorough demonstration of it due to their not being any actual cases to use, I did see that the case
management work flow rules were much easier to write and that there was an active email
notification system.
6) Creation of Forms: The ProPhoenix records product does not allow for the creation of new forms
(templates). Forms are generally created by CJIIN and are only available outside of the records
product. Also, when CJIIN creates forms, they can only be created one way for all agencies. Another
issue with ProPhoenix forms is that we do not have the ability to make individual fields mandatory.
For example, it is necessary for state reporting that Records has the value of the stolen property
when entering it. If that field were mandatory for Officers to fill out in eForms, Records would
always have it. That is not currently possible with ProPhoenix.
In TriTech, Records staff can create new forms (templates). Those templates can be created for our
own specific agency and do not need to be uniform for all other agency users. Therefore, our
agency can have the forms we want with the look we want without having to consult with and agree
with other agencies. TriTech also allows for the agency to choose which fields it wants to be
mandatory; if the Officers don’t fill them out, their incident can’t even by submitted to their
supervisor.
7) Adding/Removing Fields to Forms: ProPhoenix does not allow for the temporary insertion of field
names. For example, if the Chief wanted to easily know for the next few months all the calls that
involved a weapon, there would be no effective way to do this in the ProPhoenix records product.
In TriTech we could insert a “Weapons Involved” checkbox into the incident report form that could
be easily searched upon. When the Chief no longer wanted that information, the “Weapons
Involved” checkbox is easily removed.
8) Reporting: In ProPhoenix there are built-in reports that result in conflicting information and faulty
uploading of offenses to the state. I have not been able to reconcile the ProPhoenix Uniform Crime
Reporting stats with the State’s UCR stats since we have begun using ProPhoenix (November 2013).
I have spent many hours on the phone with the state and with CJIIN staff regarding this issue, which
is still unresolved. As a result of this issue I have been unable to supply police administration with
statistics that I am totally confident are accurate since we switched to ProPhoenix.
I talked to LOGIS staff about the reporting out of TriTech. Since TriTech is based on the old Visionair
records management system, and since TriTech kept most of the reporting features of Visionair
basically intact, I spoke to two former users of Visionair (Apple Valley Records Supervisor and
Burnsville Records Supervisor). Both of them advised that Visionair’s reporting was extremely
reliable and easy to use. They also advised that they were able to easily write reports specific to
their needs and that there was no issue with how the UCR stats were reported to the state.
In my estimation, having worked with four different law enforcement records systems over the last 24
years, ProPhoenix is by far the furthest step back we have taken in records management efficiency.