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Letter to the editor

County's new justice database delayed

An audit says a county project that integrates public records is years behind schedule.

By KAMEEL STANLEY
Published July 5, 2007

How much time and money does it take to revamp a 25-year-old criminal justice information system?

Back in 2003, Pinellas County officials predicted three years and $12.2-million to build a new CJIS system, as it is commonly referred.

But now, 18 months after the original deadline, $7.1-million has been spent, and it appears nobody knows the answer.

A report recently released by the county clerk's internal audit division revealed that virtually no phase of the project has gotten off the ground.

"There's been poor planning, poor management and poor oversight on this project, " said Robert Melton, chief deputy director for the clerk's internal audit division. "There's not a single part of this project that's in production."

When the county started the CJIS project, the goal was to develop a program that would integrate the juvenile, adult, traffic, civil and probate applications into one public records database.

There was to be 10 phases, all of which were supposed to be completed by January 2006.

Reading like a list of broken promises, Melton's 57-page report details what went wrong with the project that affects several key agencies, including the courts, clerk, state attorney, sheriff and public defender offices.

Among the criticism: The project was started without an approved business case, a blueprint that would outline the whole project. Even though one was produced two years later, it was never formally approved by the CJIS board.

"Obviously there was a need for this in-depth analysis and planning, " Melton said. "Had it happened, then we wouldn't be in the situation that we are in today."

So who dropped the ball on this one?

Depends who you ask.

Melton says the buck ultimately stops with the county's CJIS and Information Technology boards, which were supposed to be accountable for the project.

Both boards meet only periodically, about four times a year. Still, Melton said, the lack of progress should've been a major concern to officials.

Circuit Court Clerk Ken Burke, who sits on both boards, said he did notice some red flags when he got on the board a couple of years ago.

He said he requested the audit because of concerns about the technology being used and the direction the project was taking.

"I'm not pleased, because we're spending a lot of money and we don't have any results to show, " Burke said. "I've questioned these things, and I've not been happy with the answers. So far, this project hasn't completed any of the major milestones."

Burke said more communication among the project's key players is needed. The CJIS board also needs to take a more aggressive role, he said.

But Paul Alexander, who as the county's IT manager directly supervises the project, said the audit doesn't take into account the changes that have been made since 2003.

"Where my problem lies is that it doesn't consider the maturity of the organization, " he said. "There was a fair amount of work to get our people where they needed to be."

Employees had to catch up on technology while creating a completely new program, he said.

About 20 to 25 people have been dedicated to the project, he said. Adding up their salaries and benefits, it's costing about $2-million per year for the project, he said.

Alexander acknowledged that the timing and budget for the project might not match up with what was originally planned in 2003, but he said there's good reason.

At the time of the project's beginning, Alexander said, there was no comparable database on the market - hence the county's decision to undertake an in-house custom job.

However, Alexander said, officials didn't have a clear picture of the real scope of the project in 2003.

"If anything, the expectations were absolutely more ambitious than we were going to be able to deliver, " he said. "I think we are doing the things now that we need to do to get this project done."

Alexander said the current plan is to complete the first and largest part of the project, the juvenile system, and have it fully designed and ready to be tested by June 2008.

At that time, he said, officials can regroup to explore their options. For example, officials might consider integrating an off-the-shelf software into the existing project instead of continuing the custom work.

The estimated completion date is now mid 2009. But auditors predict the project won't actually be done until 2014.

"At this point, nobody knows when it's going to be fully operational, " Melton said.

In the report, auditors outlined 23 recommendations for improvement, including having more involvement by the board and better tracking methods and updating the business plan.

Progress has been made, Alexander said.

"There's nothing new in there (the audit) that we didn't know, " he said. "The majority of those things we're either doing now or have corrected."

[Last modified July 4, 2007, 21:34:10]