Attachment_J.11_-_IJIS_Integrated_CMS_RFP_2002.pdf

REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL Solicitation Number CSP-02-019 D.C. SUPERIOR COURT

INTEGRATED JUSTICE INFORMATION SYSTEM WASHINGTON, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

SECTION A PAGE A - 1

A SOLICITATION/CONTRACT FORM

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT

SOLICITATION, OFFER AND AWARD FOR SUPPLIES, OR SERVICES

ISSUED BY: DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT

ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES DIVISION

PROCUREMENT AND CONTRACTS BRANCH

515 5TH STREET, NW, ROOM 319 WASHINGTON,

D.C. 20001

DATE ISSUED July 15, 2002 OPENING DATE: July 15, 2002 OPENING TIME: 10:00 am EDT

SOLICITATION NUMBER: CSP-02-019 CLOSING DATE: August 16, 2002 CLOSING TIME: 3:00 pm EDT

OFFER/BID FOR: INTEGRATED JUSTICE INFORMATION SYSTEM

MARKET TYPE: Open

TABLE OF CONTENTS

(X) SEC. DESCRIPTION PP (X) SEC. DESCRIPTION PP

X A Solicitation/Offer/Award Form A-1 X H Special Contract Requirements H-1 X B Supplies or Services & Price /Cost B-1 X I Contract Clauses I-1 X C Description/Specs. Work Statement C-1 X J List of Attachments J-1 X D Packaging and Marking D-1 X K Representation Certificates K-1 X E Inspection and Acceptance E-1 X L Instructions, Conditions, Notices L-1 X F Deliveries and Performance F-1 X M Evaluation Factors for Award M-1 X G Contract Administration Data G-1 X Att Attachments J-1 through J-13

OFFER (TO BE COMPLETED BY OFFEROR)

Note: In sealed bid solicitations “Offer” and "Offeror” mean “Bid” and “Bidder.”

The undersigned offers and agrees that, with respect to all terms and conditions accepted by The Court under “AWARD” below, this offer and the provisions of the RFP/IFB shall constitute a Formal Contract.

OFFEROR

Name and title of Person Authorized to Sign Offer:

(Type or Print)

Name:

Street:

City, State:

Zip Code:

Signature

(Seal)

Date:

Telephone Number: ( )

Impress

Corporate

Seal

Corporate (Seal)

(Secretary)(Attest)

AWARD

(To be completed by the District of Columbia Court)

CONTRACT NO. AWARD AMOUNT $

ACCEPTED AS TO THE FOLLOWING ITEMS:

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT BY:______________________________________

CONTRACTING OFFICER

CONTRACT PERIOD: ____________________________ __________, 20_____

AWARD DATE

SECTION B PAGE B - 1

B SUPPLIES OR SERVICES AND PRICES/COSTS

B.1 OVERVIEW

The District of Columbia Superior Court, hereafter also referred to as “DCSC” or “The Court,” is soliciting proposals from qualified Contractors for the acquisition and implementation of a commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) Integrated Justice Information System (IJIS) software.

Qualified Offerors shall have a commercially available product that has been installed in a court of similar size and complexity (e.g., case load, multiple court types included in the enterprise) as The Court.

B.2 CONTRACT TYPE:

The contract awarded under this request for proposal shall be a time and material contract with a fixed price component and shall include direct labor hours at specified fixed hourly rates that include wages, overhead, general and administrative expenses, profit, and materials required at cost.

B.3 PRICING INSTRUCTIONS

The proposed price furnished by the Offeror shall be itemized for the services set forth in Section C and the other sections of the RFP and defined in Attachment J-2, Price Schedule. This shall include the estimated direct labor hours at specified fixed hourly rates that include wages, overhead, general and administrative expenses, profit, and materials required cost based on the usage.

The Offeror must submit the cost for the software and related services for the Base year and all Option Years as specified in the Price Schedule and in accordance with Section C, Scope of Services, of this Request for Proposal (RFP). For additional price proposal requirements, refer to Section L.7.1.1.

Price Tables A through L, along with all supporting documentation shall be submitted under Tab A, Section 1.1, of the Price Proposal.

B.3.1 TABLE A – SOFTWARE ACQUISITION, CUSTOMIZATION,

INSTALLATION, DATA CONVERSION, AND MAINTENANCE

Fulfillment of all requirements listed in Attachment J-1 shall be included in the purchase price in Table A (Software Acquisition, Customization, Installation, Data Conversion, and Maintenance) , either as the base price or as a priced customization or modification of the core software.

The price of acquisition shall include the cost of customization and data conversion for each phase of implementation. This assumes that the application shall be implemented in phases, according to the instructions in Section C, and that each implementation phase shall include integrating one or more branches or divisions within The Court’s overall structure into the Integrated Justice Information System.

SECTION B PAGE B - 2

B.3.2 TABLES B AND E – LABOR UNIT PRICES FOR SYSTEM ENGINEERING

AND DATA CONVERSION SUPPORT

The labor rates shall be based on the personnel required to perform the services identified in Section C and defined in Volume I, Tab D, Management Capability. These services are limited to those proposed activities and tasks that fall outside of the condition of meeting all defined requirements as noted in C.13 and elsewhere for the core system and the accompanying data conversion required to implement each phase of the IJIS.

When completing Section B, Tables B and E, the Offeror shall submit the proposed ceiling hourly rate for each labor category for the base and option periods for both on-site and off-site efforts. As The Court has limited physical space, it is expected that most of the customization and modification efforts shall be performed at the Offeror’s facility, while testing, installation and implementation shall occur at The Court’s facilities. Tables B, D, E, and G shall reflect the fully burdened ceiling rates for labor. For purposes of preparing their proposal and its price information, the Offeror shall use the labor category description in Section C.13 to guide their determination of the necessary labor categories. The selection of offered labor categories shall represent the type of labor skills that shall generally be required. All labor rates for purposes of this solicitation shall be based on services being provided in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area.

B.3.3 TABLES C AND F – ESTIMATED HOURS FOR SYSTEM ENGINEERING

AND DATA CONVERSION SUPPORT

The estimate of hours for each labor category by year, presented in Tables C and F shall reflect the projected plan and schedule for services defined in Volume I, Section E.

B.3.4 TABLES D AND G – ESTIMATED LABOR PRICE

Tables D and G represent the estimated annual, and fully-loaded labor price for both System Engineering and Data Conversion support services.

B.3.5 TABLES H AND I – ESTIMATED ODC’S AND ADDITIONAL HARDWARE

AND SOFTWARE COST AND PRICE

When completing Section B, Tables H and I, the Offeror shall submit cost estimates plus the indirect handling rate for the estimated travel, tools, and other direct costs, as well as for additional hardware and software beyond that provided as part of the IJIS solution per contract year.

B.3.6 TABLE J – SAMPLE TERMS AND AGREEMENTS

To facilitate the negotiation of terms and conditions, the Offeror shall submit samples of any standard terms and conditions desired to be part of a purchase agreement, summarized in Table J and supported with appropriate documentation. These samples must include a proposed purchase agreement, annual license agreement, maintenance agreement, and other terms or conditions that the Offeror would want included in a purchase agreement and/or subsequent working agreement

SECTION B PAGE B - 3

with The Court. Alternatives may be offered, but the Table must at minimum represent the offering priced in Table A.

B.3.7 TABLE K – TOTAL EVALUATED PROPOSAL PRICE

Table K shall reflect the total evaluated proposal price, which consists of the sum of each annual estimated prices from Tables A, D, G, H, and I, summed annually and for the total term of the contract, including option years.

B.3.8 TABLE L – PROPOSED PAYMENT SCHEDULE

Offerors shall submit a payment schedule in Table L, linked to specified milestones and deliverables identified in the Offeror’s project plan, contained in Section E of Volume I of their proposal. Billing amounts shall not be considered earned until those milestones are completed and accepted by The Court. Examples of milestones that may be used for this purpose include completion of initial setup, data conversion, training, etc.

SECTION C PAGE C - 1

C DESCRIPTION / SPECIFICATIONS / WORK STATEMENT

C.1 INTRODUCTION

The District of Columbia Superior Court, hereafter referred to as “The Court,” is seeking to acquire and implement a Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) product that, in its original configuration or with limited customization, provides an integrated multi-court case tracking system that meets the needs of The Court. Within The Court, this undertaking is identified and referred to as the Integrated Justice Information System (IJIS). The Court anticipates acquiring the COTS product and any required customization and support from a single Offeror. The selected single Offeror shall provide its wholly owned product and all required services with no third-party (e.g., other company’s) licensing or participation, or the selected single Offeror shall function as the “Prime Contractor”, that is the selected single Offeror shall be the sole point of interaction with The Court and provide their product and support plus any and all licensing, code modification, services, training, and installation required from other sources. The responsibility of the selected single Offeror is to perform the duties necessary to acquire, customize, install, test, integrate, convert data, train, and document IJIS. During the installation process, the selected single Offeror shall, as directed and agreed upon, re-design or re-engineer the present Court systems so the present Court systems correctly integrate with IJIS. Additionally, the selected single Offeror shall convert data residing in other Court systems to be viable and valid data, both in content and usable format, in IJIS.

Within this SOW the words “customize” and “modify” and their tenses have specific and distinct meanings.

“Customize” means all changes to the COTS product are treated as enhancements and shall remain as features in subsequent releases and/or versions of the Offeror’s COTS product without additional costs to The Court. Customization shall NOT require any changes to the core code of the program(s) and shall continue automatically when commercially available upgrades are installed.

“Modify,” means a change or changes are made and are in effect for this sole implementation, release, or version. The change or changes may or may not appear in subsequent releases or versions of the Offeror’s COTS product. Modification implies that changes are made to the core code of the product and that these changes shall not continue when commercially available upgrades are installed and may further present conflicts with the upgrades.

C.2 BACKGROUND

The Court is likely the most unique court in the United States of America. In all other areas of America there are various local (city, county, etc.) and state courts with each jurisdiction providing distinct services to its citizens. While Washington, D.C. (D.C. or the District) is a city, it also functions as a state. The Court, therefore, provides services at both the city and state level. D.C. is also unique in that the Federal Government had total oversight of its operations

SECTION C PAGE C - 2

until approximately 30 years ago. Since then the District has gained a measure of self-rule, but the U.S. Government still has a considerable amount of oversight or involvement in its operations.

Budgets and funding within the District (as with other large cities) have been a major concern.

Receiving low priority for funding caused many executive agencies, the school system, and The Court to make do with what they had or could afford with their limited funding. This has resulted in a plethora of disjointed processes and procedures, both manual and automated, in the executive agencies, the school system, and The Court. Both the District executive office and The Court have undertaken projects to re-engineer themselves. The Court is looking to re-define its manual and automated processes, both in its internal procedures and operations among its own departments, as well as in its interactions with outside agencies and partners.

One of the weaknesses identified within The Court and among its partners is in the Case Tracking area. Each of the major courts under the Superior Court, and departments or agencies they interact with, have their own Case Tracking system or process. There are 18 identified case management systems in use. This results in loss of time, loss of information, duplication, and extra cost.

As a result of these findings, the determination was made that The Court, through its Information Technology Division (ITD), would improve the case tracking and reporting capabilities of The Court through the acquisition of a full-featured case management system that, while using current technology, also provides for the implementation of newer technologies at a later time.

This project was named the Integrated Justice Information System (IJIS). The plan is to bring courts sequentially on-line. The original plan identified the Juvenile Court as the first court to implement the IJIS. However, U.S. Government legislation now requires that a group of courts, now known as the Family Court, be the first court implemented on IJIS. Within the Family Court, the Abuse and Neglect Court shall be implemented first. The current planned implementation sequence is: Family Court, Civil Court, Probate Court, Criminal Court, and Multi-door resolution. Other than Family Court, the sequence may change.

IJIS is to improve the quality and the effectiveness of case processing in The Court. It shall consider all aspects of case processing including, but not limited to, such processes as Case Management, Financial Accounting, Case Initiation, Scheduling, Management Reporting and Docketing. This project is not limited to The Court in that it shall attempt to discover methods for electronically exchanging vital information among the outside justice agencies with minimal effort using secure web-based technology.

The Court is currently using several mainframe applications that were developed in-house over the years. These applications are primarily case management systems that collect valuable data, but fall short in their effective use and access of this information. Some of the applications have limited financial integration functions.

The Court is in the process of migrating from the mainframe platform to a Client/Server platform. A multiple year plan has been developed for this migration to Client/Server to allow funding of the new Infrastructure.

SECTION C PAGE C - 3

C.3 OBJECTIVES

The objective of this program is to provide an integrated case management system, using a Commercial-Off-the-Shelf (COTS) product that requires minimal customization and no core modification, for the various courts within the District of Columbia Superior Courts system.

This case management system shall be based on an RDBMS, preferably Oracle, and shall support traditional case management (jacket, docket/case number tracking), document management, scheduling, financial transactions (including fees), accounts receivable and payable, escrow accounts for probate, grant funds, and other financial transactions using Generally Accepted Accounting Principles for Government organizations. The system shall be able to manage automated data exchange with external third party organizations, preferably using web browser technology in a secure format (e.g., HTTPS, Legal XML). It shall be implemented on a phased basis, with the Family Court activities being the first iteration of implementation. The implementation for Family Court shall establish, based on business rules, methods for automating management of the “One Family, one Judge” requirements of the Family Court Act.

C.3.1 RFP and SOW Objectives

The objectives of this RFP and the requirements contained in the SOW are:

To solicit proposals to acquire a COTS product for a court wide Integrated Justice Information System.

To solicit proposals to provide any required customization of the COTS product.

To solicit proposals to provide data conversion from the legacy data to the selected COTS product.

To solicit proposals to provide training on the selected COTS product.

To request multi-year implementation of the case types.

To outline The Court’s Family, Civil, Criminal, and Probate court processes so that The Court’s Offerors have an understanding of the functions and interactions within The Court and how The Court interacts with their internal and external partners.

To provide a detailed explanation of required system functionality and performance.

To provide statistical information regarding case volume that shall affect performance requirements.

To identify the Project Management and Reporting Requirements.

To identify test planning, test execution, and test reporting requirements.

To provide RFP response instructions.

To provide contractual requirements.

C.3.2 IJIS OBJECTIVES

Based on current operations and findings determined through reviews and interviews the objectives of IJIS are as follows.

C.3.2.1 Efficiency Goals Reduce or eliminate redundant data entry Improve access to case information Improve the generation of notifications and forms

SECTION C PAGE C - 4

Improve response time to research information Improve the ability to meet statutory requirements Improve the ability to monitor mandatory review hearings Improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the justice process Increase the use of automation Improve the timeliness of information Reduce the amount of manual paper handling Increase the use of standard data formats and data edits

SECTION C PAGE C - 5

C.3.2.2 Integration Goals Improve communication among offices Improve the ability to allow multiple user to access the case information simultaneously Improve electronic interfaces with external systems Promote an integrated solution that supports a single source of information

C.3.2.3 Access and Reporting Goals Improve access to procedure and statutes Improve access to literature or documentation regarding necessary procedures Improve access to case information Provide 24-hour access Improve case statistical reporting Improve the response time to public inquiries information

C.3.2.4 Accuracy Goals Ensure compliance with statutes Improve case information reporting Improve the administration of the system Ensure audit-ability of financial records

C.3.2.5 Exchanging data with financial intuitions using electronic account balancing interfaces

C.3.2.6 Management and Control Goals Improve the consistency of entering, retrieving, and manipulating data Reduce the cost of the judicial process Eliminate unauthorized access to sensitive case information Eliminate unauthorized access to confidential cases Improve system flexibility and growth potential

C.4 CURRENT OPERATIONS

The following information is provided to assist the Offeror in understanding the current environment and operational characteristics of the numerous case management systems and to provided information for the Offeror to use in considering data conversion and interfaces.

C.4.1 Hardware

Court applications operate on an IBM S/390 and 12 servers using Windows NT LAN platform for connectivity, running mostly TCP/IP network protocol over a 10/100 Mbps Ethernet-based backbone. The LAN also uses AppleTalk, IPX/SPX, and NetBEUI protocols. There are approximately 1050 PC workstations and 50 mainframe 3270 terminals on this network.

AppleTalk connects a PowerMac G3 server to 24 Mac workstations, which are also connected to the Windows NT Microsoft Exchange server.

SECTION C PAGE C - 6

The LAN extends to three annex buildings creating a Court-wide LAN or Wide Area Network (WAN) using Venison’s Switched Multi-megabit Data Service (SMDS) at 1.17mbs. A T-1 connection exists between The Court’s main building and buildings A and B. The four Supervision Field Units are connected by 56k lines. Further, The Court WAN is connected to CSOSA and the D.C.’s WANs via 10mbs and 56k ISDN connections, respectively.

The mainframe was purchased in April 1999 for the Y2K Conversion Project to replace the older IBM ES/9000. The S/390 runs the OS/390 operating system, version 2.4. The IT Division is currently upgrading to version 4.1.

C.4.2 Mainframe Applications

There are 19 unlinked applications presently in use as follows:

The IBM S/390 mainframe houses 13 of the applications Three of which are for inquiry purposes and track past financial data and not discussed in this document.

Eight were developed in COBOL and CICS with the data stored in VSAM flat-file formats.

The CIS and Property Office System applications were developed in IDMS/R and the data exists in IDMS Version 14.2.

Six are desktop applications

A discussion of the ten mainframe applications are presented to assist the responder in understanding the environment The Court works in and to assist in grasping an understanding of the needs driving the IJIS program.

C.4.2.1 Attorney Bar-Code Cross-Reference (ATSS)

ATSS is a cross-application reference database on attorneys licensed to practice law in D.C.

The data is uploaded monthly via a magnetic tape received from the D.C. Bar Association. The following systems access this data: Criminal Information System (CIS), JISRA, Probate Court’s Information System (PCIS), and TDMS. Also, CIS provides an on-line search capability.

TDMS has a separate record of attorneys within its own database that includes disbarred members; therefore, it searches ATSS only if a bar number is not found in its database.

C.4.2.2 Criminal Information System (CIS)

CIS is a case management system for adult felonies and misdemeanors, and for traffic NOIs (Notice of Infractions). Developed in 1978 and later rewritten in the early 1990s, CIS is the only mainframe application in The Court that uses a relational database, Computer Associate’s IDMS. It was designed primarily as a calendaring system with some docketing capability.

Also, CIS produces periodic reports for scheduling and statistical purposes.

CIS exchanges data with several other databases via The Court’s WAN connections. Data are transferred hourly and daily to the Criminal Justice Information System (CJIS). Maintained by the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD), CJIS was originally intended to serve as the repository for D.C.’s inter-agency criminal justice system. Now, The Court and other District and Federal agencies use the system for simple data exchanges. Electronic exchanges include:

CJIS sends data captured on the PD163 form to CIS for case initiation.

SECTION C PAGE C - 7

CIS returns data on new and updated cases including, but not limited to, defendants’ details and final case dispositions.

Pretrial Services sends a monthly tape to CIS containing defendants’ addresses.

CIS provides a weekly tape to the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) on traffic convictions (I12). NOTE: Traffic convictions related to drugs as pursuant to the Uniform Control Substance Act (W29) are sent weekly in paper-format to DMV as well.

Monthly tapes from Bureau of Traffic Adjudications (BTA) on D.C. cases paid at its office.

The following database or programming deficiencies were noted:

Data fields restrict the capturing of full sentencing conditions.

In traffic cases involving multiple infractions from the same incident, each infraction with all repeating incident data must be entered separately.

Monthly statistical reports do not record case transfers between calendars, which must be added manually to reflect individual judicial statistics accurately.

The computer-generated prisoner transport list shall not display defendants in custody for any offense other than the one scheduled for appearance (Criminal Division - Felony).

CIS needs the capacity to allow the entry of an unlimited number of user-defined events (Domestic Violence Unit (DVU)).

CIS cannot track the re-assignments of judicial officers to other calendars or cases. To generate an accurate calendar, DVU intentionally enters erroneous information, which may or may not be deleted later (DVU).

C.4.2.3 Court Reporters System (CRS)

Consisting of four on-line screens and one VSAM file, this application tracks cases under appeal, the transfer of documents between ACO and COA, and the production of transcripts. The Court Reporting Department and ACO in the Special Operations Divisions use this application.

Although one screen is used for appeals, significant amounts of data are captured.

C.4.2.4 Criminal Division Property Office System

This application tracks the receipt, movement, and storage of criminal exhibits and evidence in the custody of The Court’s Property Office.

C.4.2.5 Juror Information System

The Juror’s Office system performs juror management functions, including printing summonses to District residents for jury service, qualifying jurors, randomly assigning jurors to jury panels, dispensing payments for juror services using batch checks and on-line automated teller machines (ATMs), and generating juror management reports and statistics tracking daily juror utilization.

The cash disbursement capability of transportation fees via automatic teller machines (ATMs) is considered a national model.

D.C.’s Board of Election, Department of Taxation, and DMV provide data via magnetic tape to create the list of potential jurors.

SECTION C PAGE C - 8

C.4.2.6 Juvenile Information System Records Access (JISRA)

Based on an application in Rhode Island and consisting of 12 VSAM files, JISRA was developed over 15 years ago as a juvenile case docketing system. Over the years, a social services module was programmed into the application. The application contains demographic data on juveniles and their families on juvenile delinquency/supervision (PINS) and abuse/neglect cases. In addition, data are captured on one on-line screen for probation activities in the Social Services Division. JISRA provides the following electronic data exchanges:

JISRA sends nightly case data to JDCMIS and JDCMIS provides drug test information to

JISRA.

JISRA provides a weekly tape to DMV on juvenile drug convictions.

JISRA sends a magnetic tape to the National Center for Juvenile Justice (NCJJ), a monthly hard-copy report to R&D for statistical purposes, and a monthly or by-request report to

CFSA.

JISRA is a fixed format, reactive, and code-dependent application. Besides the limited event information, this application is essentially an index to the case files. The following database or programming issues were noted:

JISRA does not capture all events associated with juvenile cases, such as Juvenile probation interview reporting, hearings, and subsequent case reviews.

JISRA calculates the count of pending cases differently than the division.

While JISRA provides a number of reports, they are not useful to judicial officers and division directors.

No tickler notifications or reminders are available for adoption cases. Staff members must track elapsed time and deadlines manually.

C.4.2.7 Personnel Data System (PDS)

The Court has implemented a client-server Oracle based Human Resource Information System, provided by Personal Data Systems, to manage personnel issues.

C.4.2.8 Probate Court Information System (PCIS)

PCIS originated from an existing application obtained from a county-level court in Clearwater, Florida. The IT Division modified the application to meet The Court’s needs. The 15-plus years of data resides in four primary VSAM files: Name, Case, Docketing, and Involved Persons.

C.4.2.9 Probation Activity Reporting System (PARS)

PARS is the case management application for adult probation. In 1997, the D.C. Adult Probation Department and the database were transferred to CSOSA of the federal government.

CSOSA is developing new applications to replace PARS.

C.4.2.10 Transactional Data Management System (TDMS)

Developed by the IT Division in 1982, TDMS consists of three basic record types: Standard Docket Record (SDR), Address Docket Record (ADR), and Key Data Record (KDR). The application provides case tracking, docketing, calendaring, and aggregate statistical reporting.

SECTION C PAGE C - 9

Specific features include replicating data for linked cases, storing previous data record “snapshots” for rollback capability, maintaining attorney details, and sealing case data on various levels. TDMS consists of approximately nine similar applications for the following court divisions:

Division / Branch Application

Civil Actions CIV

Landlord and Tenant LNT

Small Claims SMC

Adoptions DRA

Domestic Relations DRB

Mental Health/Mental Retardation MHR

Paternity/Support PSB

Domestic Violence DVU

Multi-Door Dispute Resolution MDR

In 1998, the District-wide Child Support System residing in OCC replaced the PSB application.

C.4.3 Desk-Top Computers

There are six desktop systems. Four systems – The Court Finance and Revenue System (CFARS), Marriage Bureau Information System (MBIS), the Tax Court System, and the Multi-door Intake and Referral System (MDIRS) - reside in client-server environments. one system, Victims Compensation, operates in a LAN environment. The Peachtree Accounting System operates in a stand-alone PC environment.

C.4.3.1 Marriage Bureau Information System (MBIS)

The application demonstrates programming knowledge, in MS Access, in which the IT Division and the end-users collaborated on the design of the application. Data exchange consists of an ASCII file on a floppy diskette sent weekly to the Vital Records in the Health Department to report marriages. The two noticeable deficiencies are slow response time and limited historical data (current to 1998 only).

C.4.3.2 Tax Court System

The Tax Court System is a networked system that resides on a Compaq 3000 server. The Tax Court System performs limited calendaring, notice-generation, and docketing functions for civil and criminal tax cases filed in the Tax Office of the Special Operations Division. An outside

SECTION C PAGE C - 10

consultant developed the application using Microsoft Visual FoxPro. The notice generation capability provides time saving efficiencies.

As for deficiencies, the application was not designed for criminal cases; therefore, certain data for tax criminal cases are not captured electronically. Also, no electronic link exists to ATSS to verify the bar membership status of attorneys.

C.4.3.3 Multi-Door Intake and Referral System (MDIRS)

Residing on a PowerMac G3 server in a Mac O/S environment, this application was developed in 1992 by an outside consultant using Helix Express, an object-oriented relational database. It performs calendaring, scheduling, and docketing functions for ADR sessions; contains data on cases and mediators and their assignments; and prints payment vouchers and a variety of standardized reports. Figure 1 is the scheduling screen in MDIRS.

Figure 1. MDIRS Scheduling Screen

There are several aspects to MDIRS:

It has a graphical interface;

It maintains an online referral agency database that is updated by staff at the beginning of each calendar year;

MDIRS has a built-in tickler capability;

MDD staff members are able to produce their own queries and reports.

C.4.3.4 Court Finance and Revenue System (CFARS)

CFARS provides comprehensive support for the management of all fees, bonds, receivables and payables within The Court system. It interfaces with the Peachtree accounting system and with other Court accounting and finance systems.

SECTION C PAGE C - 11

shall

C.4.3.5 Crime Victims Q & A Claims Software

This application originated from the Iowa Q&A claims software that was modified in 1997 for use by the Crime Victims Compensation Program under the guidance of the Office for Victims of Mentor Program. It was designed, modified and still supported by two outside consultants from Iowa. The Crime Victims Q&A claims application was developed in Symantec’s Q&A software. The claims management application provides automated claim number generation, letter and notice generation, user-defined code tables, and workflow ticklers. The following database or programming deficiencies were noted:

Multi-tasking is not available when running macros. All staff members have to exit certain files before certain macros shall run correctly.

C.4.3.6 Peachtree Integrated Accounting System

Operating in Windows 98 on various PC workstations, the Peachtree Accounting Software maintains The Court’s general ledger; performs bank reconciliation; tracks bad check receivables, escrow, restitution, and other liability accounts; generates disbursements for refunds, revenue transmittals to treasurer, and other payables. All Finance Offices use the software, an “off-the-shelf” accounting package. The following database or programming deficiencies were noted:

Software is dependent on CFARS for essential data (uploaded daily);

Case numbers are used to identify individuals;

Software is not network-based, which physically restricts transactions to specific workstations.

C.5 STATE OF CURENT BUSINESS PROCESSES

The information in this sub-section includes findings reported by the National Center for State Courts (NCSC) in the performance of their contract to The Court. The information drawn from the NCSC report included in this section “is not the result of a detailed management review of all practices and procedures in each of these divisions and operations.” Instead, The Court retained the consulting firm of Booz Allen & Hamilton to conduct a full process review of The Court’s major activities to establish a firm baseline for change management and business process re-engineering associated with the implementation of the Family Court Act and the facilitation of IJIS integrated case management tools. These findings, both drawn from the NSCS review and the Booz Allen & Hamilton process evaluation, are the foundation upon which the IJIS requirements were then developed and upon which the accompanying business process re-engineering shall be based as the new IJIS system is implemented.

The detailed requirements for this effort, presented in Section C.13, were then created using industry standard Joint Requirements Development methodology and adapting the requirements question script devised by the International Function Point User Group (IFPUG), Version 5, as the basis for development.

The information in this sub-section is presented as background information to the requirements presented in Section C.13. This information shall assist the Offeror in replying to the instructions

SECTION C PAGE C - 12

presented in Section L and shall provide an overview of The Court’s objectives in implementing an integrated case management system.

C.5.1 Civil Division

The Civil Division has jurisdiction over any D.C. civil action at law or in equity other than family law matters, regardless of the amount in controversy, unless jurisdiction is vested exclusively in the federal court. The major types of cases processed in the division include:

Civil actions and cases in equity Small claims (cases valued at $5,000 or less) Landlord and tenant disputes1

The Court has a sophisticated plan for managing the pace of litigation in civil actions, which has been recognized nationally as a noteworthy and effective approach to civil case flow management.

C.5.1.1 Judgment Office

Judgment orders and notices are processed manually. The office also completes a reason for notice form for each notice. Once the notice and form are completed, copies are placed in the case jacket and the originals are sent to the data entry clerk.

Small claim case filings received through the mail account for about 70% of the workload and the remaining 30 percent are filed in person. One full-time clerk handles mail, certified mail, and time and attendance. The following items were noted:

All case events are scheduled manually.

An automated court appearance notification system is used to provide parties with their appearance dates.

Because the branch does not have access to financial data, it cannot provide parties with information on escrow payments or other financial information.

The Court is currently undertaking a pilot project for electronic filing utilizing the Courtlink system.

C.5.2 Criminal Division

The Criminal Division is responsible for processing and adjudicating cases involving adults charged with criminal and traffic offenses. The major types of cases are felonies, misdemeanors, special proceedings, and traffic cases. The U.S. Attorney’s Office (USAO) prosecutes felonies and serious misdemeanors. The Office of the Corporation Counsel (OCC) prosecutes other adult matters such as violations of the D.C. municipal code and traffic violations.

C.5.2.1 U.S. and D.C. Misdemeanors and Serious Traffic Cases

The following items were noted:

In general, police officers do not deliver Notices of Infraction (NOIs) in serious traffic cases until 2-3 weeks after arrest.

1 The division also hears administrative appeals under the Merit Personnel Act, as well as appeals from the Traffic Adjudication Appeals Board.

SECTION C PAGE C - 13

For serious traffic cases, initial filings are received by fax from the Office of Corporate Council (OCC) and they are often difficult to read.

C.5.2.2 Traffic Cases and Other Minor Offenses

The following items were noted:

For minor traffic cases, defendants are not assigned appearance dates during the issuance of the NOIs.

Tracking “post and forfeit” traffic cases, where a defendant is released on a promise to appear or by posting bond, is a major problem.

C.5.2.3 Special Proceedings Branch - Warrant Office

The following items were noted:

The office uses Microsoft Access to track felony bench and search warrants.

The office re-enters bench warrants in the Washington Areas Law Enforcement System

(WALES).

Upon receiving a felony bench warrant, the office prepares a manual transmittal form and delivers the form and the original warrant to the U.S. Marshal’s Office. The U.S. Marshal’s Office validates the transmittal and returns the original to the Warrant Office.

U.S. Marshal’s Office provides the Warrant office with a hard-copy lock-up list. Some of the same information is available on-line in CIS. Also, the IT Division provides the U.S.

Marshal’s Office with the list, which is generated from CIS.

C.5.2.4 Crime Victims Compensation Program

This program processes claims for compensation by victims of crime. It also handles appeals to the Board of Appeals and to the Chief Judge regarding the denial of claims.

Since victim information is not captured in CIS, it is difficult to identify the case and the defendant.

Requests for claim payment are hand delivered at least twice a week to the Financial Operations Division (FOD). After the checks are issued by FOD, the Crime Victims Q&A claim software is updated with the check information.

C.5.3 Family Division

The Family Division processes and adjudicates juvenile and family-related matters, including juvenile delinquency and supervision cases; child abuse and neglect cases; divorce cases with related custody and financial support issues; termination of parental rights, relinquishments and adoptions; mental health and mental retardation cases; and paternity and child support cases. On a day-to-day basis, the division interacts with the Domestic Violence Unit and the Social Services Division.

Identifying other cases involving the same child or family is difficult.

Providing monthly statistical reports to judges, court administrators, and R&D involves retrieving data from two mainframe applications (TDMS and JISRA) and re-entering that data in a desktop software application.

All branches within the Family Division maintain manual log sheets for calendar and case number assignments.

SECTION C PAGE C - 14

Clerks maintain manual “stop calendars” – a hand count of the number of cases scheduled for initial hearings on any particular day – as a mechanism to limit the number of hearings scheduled each day.

C.5.3.1 Domestic Relations Branch

The following was noted:

Adoption case processing largely involves handwritten entries on pre-printed forms.

SECTION C PAGE C - 15

C.5.3.1.1 Child Support Program

The following was noted:

The division’s information system does not provide any feedback on “private” cases (non-governmental cases involving children), even though these cases interface with the Title IV- D system.

The program’s computer information system is unrelated to The Court’s other systems.

Program staff members need information, however, about child support requirements ordered by The Court in proceedings other than those in the program.

C.5.3.2 Juvenile and Neglect Branch

The following was noted:

Cases in the Juvenile and Neglect Branch are scheduled manually.

Charge codes are not included on complaint forms for delinquency cases; however, case jackets are created before OCC decides to file a petition.

C.5.3.3 Mental Health/Mental Retardation Branch

The following was noted:

All case numbers are assigned using a manual card catalog system.

In a mental retardation case, a clerk manually prepares a list of the names and addresses of parties for the case jacket.

C.5.4 Social Services Division

This division is The Court’s juvenile probation and child abuse department. The division performs functions for three categories of clients:

For juveniles charged with either delinquency or status offenses: intake and diagnostic services; coordination and provision of services to court-involved families; and probation supervision through decentralized field units in the District.

For children who are physically or sexually abused, intake and diagnostic services and protective supervision.

For families in domestic relations cases, custody investigations.

The efficiency of the division’s operations suffers from the limited ability to integrate probation case management records with the case management information systems (largely JISRA) in the Family Division. In the absence of such integration, the Social Services Division must separately record and maintain information that has already been entered in JISRA, while information from the records of Social Services activities must be re-entered in JISRA. This creates an environment with multiple points of risk, including multiple entry, considerable manual activity, and potential communications risks.

Presently, the Juvenile Drug Court Program has developed and implemented a multi-user Management Information and Case Management system. The system is a client-server database application using MS Access 2000 for the front end and SQL Server 7.0 for the backend. The design of the database includes the ability to add interfaces for all components of The Court Social Services Division. The tool provides for the expansion of the application to serve the probation supervision field units, the diagnostic units, probation intake and future special units

SECTION C PAGE C - 16

which may be developed to provide services consistent with trends in the field of social services delivery.

C.5.4.1 Domestic Violence Unit

The Domestic Violence Unit (DVU) processes civil and criminal cases that involve domestic violence. There are four different kinds and sources of domestic violence cases (three civil and one criminal):

Any intra-family case involving requests for a civil protection order, originally filed in the Domestic Violence Unit.

Any divorce or custody case originally filed in the Domestic Relations Branch of the Family Division that is found to involve allegations of domestic violence or to have a related protection petition filed.

Any paternity or support case originally filed in the Child Support Program of the Family Division that is found to have a domestic violence issue or to have a related protection petition filed.

Any criminal offense originally filed in the Criminal Division that is found at criminal arraignment to involve domestic violence charges.

In addition to processing civil and criminal domestic violence cases, DVU enters information from bench warrants and protection orders (both temporary and civil) into WALES. They also enter information from support and restitution payment orders into the Unisys Child Support Computer System. Some major issues are:

Much information that could be exchanged electronically with the Adult Probation Unit must be handled manually.

Having multiple points of data entry is required in some instances, but in other instances, it creates avoidable inefficiencies.

There is duplicate data entry for domestic violence cases, both in court databases and in WALES. For example, information entered into TDMS must be re-entered in WALES.

Same person identifiers are not used across divisions. Identification of specific persons is complicated and sometimes impossible. DVU staff members state that a petitioner usually does not know biographical on the alleged batterer, such as the SSN or the date of birth, or his/her permanent address. Furthermore, they feel that using the SSN would present problems because all civil records are considered public records.

To comply with a new rule, DVU must search for related cases, both civil and criminal, for parties that come through its unit.

DVU staff members use the newly obtained ability to have two simultaneous sessions, i.e.,;

i.e., a screen with both CIS and TDMS available and active, to conduct court history searches. Other improvements such as having the search results displayed from most recent to oldest events would be helpful.

In addition, the following findings specific to DVU civil and criminal cases have been made:

C.5.4.1.1 Civil Protective Order Cases

DVU needs to interact electronically with other justice partners as well as with other jurisdictions, including Prince Georges County and Montgomery County in Maryland. Also, the unit needs to exchange data with the Child Support Program in the Family Division.

SECTION C PAGE C - 17

C.5.4.1.2 U.S. Misdemeanor Cases

Because CIS cannot capture changes in courtroom assignments for cases, DVU intentionally enters erroneous information to get an accurate calendar.

C.5.5 Probate Division

The Probate Division oversees the administration of decedents’ estates, as well as guardianships and conservatorships. In a separate project completed for the Probate Division in early 2000, one of the members of the NCSC project team for this requirements analysis performed a detailed assessment of the business processes and information needs in that division, resulting in the preparation of an RFP.2 All of the conclusions from that effort are incorporated herein by reference.

Given the paper-intense nature of many probate matters, the division is a natural candidate for document imaging/scanning capability.

Many documents now filed in the division have been prepared with computers and could be filed electronically.

Because the database for probate cases does not permit ad-hoc queries, the development of any statistical data not routinely generated requires special programming.

Because information from the probate database is not in a format required for monthly statistical reports, staff members must extract such information and then re-enter it in separate report format.

The number of citizens seeking information is often greater than the number of public access mainframe terminals, and the indexing mechanism in PCIS does not make it easy to find information.

Except for cases scheduled for summary hearing, PCIS cannot produce computer-generated calendars. Court calendars are typed manually.

Data entry and maintenance involves considerable redundancy. Probate case information is docketed in PCIS from pleadings filed with The Court, court orders and manual case jacket entries.

C.5.6 Tax Division

The Tax Division hears civil appeals from the D.C. Government in tax matters as well as criminal prosecutions in tax matters. Most cases involve appeals of property tax assessments by corporations doing business in the District. In these and other civil matters (including appeals of income tax assessments and appeals of the recordation of decedents’ estates), the D.C.

Government is the respondent and is represented by the OCC. Criminal tax cases involve allegations of criminal wrongdoing by businesses or individual persons and are prosecuted by the OCC. The Tax Office of the Special Operations Division does administrative processing for tax cases.

At the initial filing, the Tax Office assigns a case number, creates a case jacket, and records the case name and case number in a manual logbook.

2 See Terry L. Brown, “District of Columbia Superior Court, Probate Division, Case Management/Imaging Request for Proposals” (Denver, Co.:

National Center for State Courts, Court Services Division and Technology Division, March 2000).

SECTION C PAGE C - 18

A party initiating a civil tax case must appear at the Tax Office, and then make payment of filing fees elsewhere and return to the Tax Office with proof of payment before the filing can be accepted.

C.5.7 Court-Appointed Counsel System

The D.C. Courts’ Joint Committee on Judicial Administration oversees a system to meet the legal mandate that The Court provides legal representation to persons who are financially unable to retain counsel. Court-appointed counsel cases are processed under the supervision of the Joint Committee by two offices:

Those involving adult criminal defendants and juvenile respondents in delinquency and supervision cases are processed by the Criminal Justice Act Office of the Public Defender Service, and are referred to as “CJA” cases.

Those involving adults or children in abuse and neglect and termination-of-parental rights proceedings are processed by Counsel for Child Abuse and Neglect Office in the Superior Court’s Family Division. They are called “CCAN” cases.

An application now being developed for The Court-appointed counsel system shall automate only part of this process. It appears not to reflect a law firm industry billing standards. We have also made the following office-specific findings about the system.

C.5.7.1 Criminal Justice Act (CJA) Cases

The voucher-processing system…