Public Safety and Justice Projects - Courts
Click on one of the agencies below to learn more about specific courts projects we have recently completed.
Courts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts
Administrative Office of the Trial Court
The Problem
The Massachusetts Trial Court consists of nine (9) departments operating on six differing computer platforms or operating systems and one totally manual process. The courts petitioned the legislature for funding to build one integrated information system that would cover all court departments, speed processing, and improve load management across the system. Based on the lack of success in prior court IT implementations, the legislature declined to provide funding until the courts could provide them with a coherent master plan to unify processing under a set of standards that would guarantee compatibility and provide flexibility for the future. Through a competitive bid process, The Point Group was awarded the project to assist the court in developing their IT master plan.
Scope of Work
The Point Group was responsible for the development of an integrated information technology plan for the Commonwealth's Trial Court. The basis for the plan developed, and funded by the legislature, was a study of the common and unique business requirements of each department within the Trial Court and the ability of the technical architecture to meet these requirements. The requirements assessment conducted by The Point Group identified the organizational, management, functional and technological requirements of the Trial Court.
As an integral component of the requirements, The Point Group analyzed the interaction which is required, by statute, regulation, function and process between Trial Court Departments and outside entities. As part of the "shared objectives" phase of this project, The Point Group brought together - for the first time - Trial Court departments and the other state and local organizations who participate in the Commonwealth's public safety/judicial system.
Results
The Point Group believes that it is essential, during the assessment of an organization, to clearly understand and define the impact of interactions with outside entities. In the case of the Trial Court, The Point Group recognized the importance of these interactions and incorporated the need to interact more efficiently into its IT plan.
The plan was presented to the legislature, by the Administrative Chief Justice, in support of the Trial Court's request for $75 million dollars in funding. The Point Group also prepared a detailed presentation, which accompanied the request and explained, in non-technical terms, the business requirements the IT plan would meet and the benefits that would result from the acquisition and implementation of the proposed technologies. In November of 1996, the General Court and the Governor approved the $75 million dollar bond authorization.
State Of Utah
Administrative Office of the Courts
The Problem
During 1998, The Point Group worked the Administrative Office of the Courts in Utah to develop a plan to enhance the Juvenile Court application system. We worked closely with the Administrative Office of the Courts, the Juvenile Courts, Division of Youth Corrections (DYC), and the supporting agencies.
The existing juvenile application served as the major source of information for all of the entities involved in the juvenile justice community. It not only provided the juvenile court with ongoing information about juveniles; it is also a vital source of information for the Division of Youth Corrections (DYC). While the application had served the State well, its technologies were out-dated, which caused a large amount of extra, inefficient work to be done. Additional functionality was required to support the user needs and provide a platform that could easily adapt to future changes.
Scope of Work
The overall objective of the project was to analyze the existing juvenile application and develop recommendations and a plan for improving the existing system. The approach to this planning project followed The Point Group's methodology for performing planning engagements. This approach involved the following four major segments:
- Data gathering -including interviews with Court and DYC personnel, surveys of Court, DYC and other juvenile stakeholders, and focus group sessions to gain consensus on and prioritize functional and technical enhancements
- Analysis - including a review of the existing application, a determination of functional and technical requirements, comparison of requirements to other juvenile applications in the commercial marketplace and in the public domain, and an analysis of other Utah agency applications with similar technical and functional characteristics
- Recommendation development - including the determination of the best approach to meeting the needs of a new juvenile application and the impact this approach would have on the existing hardware, software and network of the Courts and DYC
- Implementation plan/report development - including the development of a timetable for implementing a new juvenile application, a determination of the resources required for design, development and implementation, and a determination of the estimated cost to implement the recommendations
Results
The Point Group presented a final report to develop a plan to enhance the Juvenile court application system. After reviewing over a dozen commercial and public domain applications, none available was a good fit for the combined needs of the Juvenile Courts and DYS. The recommended solution by the project team was a transfer/build approach to develop a new application. The solution approach and timetables for delivery was enthusiastically received by the participants in the planning project. The recommended solution will meet the functional and technical needs of today and the changes and challenges of tomorrow.