POLICY REPORT
FINANCE
Date: July 5, 1995
TO: Vancouver City Council
FROM: Chief Constable in consultation with Director of
Finance.
SUBJECT: Installation of a Jail Booking and Criminal Records
Management System (CREMM/DES Project)
RECOMMENDATIONS:
A. THAT Council approve implementation of the CREMM-DES project
at a cost of $106,100 with funding to be provided as a loan
from the Service Improvement Reserve to be repaid with
interest over a four year period.
B. THAT one CPIC Operator position be eliminated six months after
the implementation of CREMM-DES to provide funding for the
project.
C. THAT Council approve the following personnel changes in the
Police Department:
Eliminate Create
1 Sergeant 1 Privacy Coordinator
(Privacy Coordinator) (Civilian)
1 Warrant Squad position 1 Privacy analyst
(Civilian) (Constable)
Subject to classification by the General Manager of Human Resource
Services. The balance of the civilian clerical positions freed-up
by the implementation of this project to be reallocated within the
department. This proposal has no net cost to the Operating Budget.
CHIEF CONSTABLE S COMMENTS
The Chief Constable RECOMMENDS approval of recommendations A, B and
C.
COUNCIL POLICY
On February 4, 1992, Council resolved that a policy be established that
there would be no net increases in services or staffing in 1992 and 1993
without appropriate offsets and that departments and boards be
instructed that any recommendations for increased staff or enhanced
programs be accompanied by recommendations for matching cost decreases
or related revenue increases.
SUMMARY
CREMM-DES is a Direct Entry System developed by the RCMP. It is an
application that contains elements of a jail booking system, CPIC and
electronic updating of Criminal Records in the National Identification
System. The CPIC and Criminal Records Systems form the backbone for
policing systems in Canada. An analysis conducted in the Information
Section has shown that considerable savings in time and elimination of
duplicated effort would result from the implementation of CREMM-DES in
the Police Department. Subsequent savings in staff resources would allow
staff to be reallocated within the department to meet needs in the
Information and Privacy Unit. A CPIC position in the Information Section
would not be required if CREMM-DES was implemented and the savings could
be applied to purchase the equipment necessary for the CREMM-DES system.
The reallocation of staff would be phased as the CREMM-DES system was
introduced, tested and put into full service. On June 12, 1995 the
Vancouver Police Department was approved by the RCMP to use the system.
Accompanying this report is the report to Council regarding staffing
requirements in the Information and Privacy Unit. The possibility of
introducing CREMM-DES, thereby reallocating staff, satisfies the
identified staffing needs. The report provides background to understand
why CREMM-DES meets an important need for staff reallocation in the
Police Department.
PURPOSE
The purpose of this report is to obtain funding for the CREMM-DES
project and approval to vary the strength of the Department in the
Information and Privacy Unit.
BACKGROUND
The RCMP have installed early versions of the CREMM-DES system in
Ottawa, Kamloops and a number of other police agencies across Canada.
These early versions have been running for over a year and the RCMP have
rewritten the system based on that experience. The enhanced system is
available for installation as of June, 1995 with expansion to include
all police agencies across Canada over the next five to ten years. The
system is actually an application that sends data to the National
Criminal Records Database and will integrate fully with CPIC Windows
which is due later this year. The CPIC and Criminal Records Systems
form the backbone for policing systems in Canada.
The advantage of our involvement in CREMM-DES is primarily to allow a
small scale re-engineering of portions of the Information Section and
Jail systems. Several positions in the Information Section will be
freed up which can be reallocated to offset staffing requirements in
other areas. This is possible because of the relationship between a
jail booking, CPIC and Criminal Records. An arrest and booking produces
approximately 29 separate steps that have to be carried out from
completing the booking and print forms to the final registration of a
criminal conviction in Ottawa. CREMM-DES reduces the steps to 18. In the
process the Police Department is able to eliminate labour intensive
manual systems. Three short examples illustrate the importance of moving
to CREMM-DES.
Warrant Process
The warrant process starts with warrants being received from the Courts
each day. The warrants are alphabetized for search through police index
cards to locate a local record number which enables access to the Local
Criminal Record file where the booking sheet is kept. The booking sheet
is used to record the subject's tombstone data: name, date of birth,
description, marks, scars, tattoos, alias and other similar information
specific to a person, onto a data entry form for entry into CPIC by CPIC
clerks. An entry is also made in a warrant number ledger, warrant name
ledger and warrant record index card. CREMM-DES, with some in-house
modifications, will eliminate most of this process and allow the CPIC
clerk to directly access the booking information and transfer the
tombstone data into CPIC. One full position in the Warrant Squad is
saved in the process.
CPIC Entry
The CPIC process currently requires a CPIC clerk to add a record of a
newly charged person to the system. The clerk alphabetizes the Court
Informations and searches the name index cards to gain access to the
Local Criminal Record file in much the same way as the Warrant Squad
process. The clerk then runs the name on CPIC and enters all tombstone
data including, in some extreme cases, up to 22 aliases. If the person
fails to appear and a warrant is issued the CPIC entry must be removed
and all of the information has to be re-entered. With the current state
of Fail to Appear warrants this "charge" to "warrant" and back process
can be reiterated many times. CREMM-DES allows the clerk to search for a
booking sheet electronically. The booking data contains all known alias
through an automatic function at the time of booking. The tombstone data
is transmitted to CPIC. If the status of the CPIC Entry changes from a
"charge" to a "warrant" a search is made and the status of the subject's
entry is changed. The tombstone data is automatically added. Probation
entries are similarly simplified. Two CPIC clerical positions are saved
in the process.
Criminal Conviction Tracking
In the Criminal Records Unit, once again a booking sheet is used as a
source document to input the Case Tracking System and to complete the
RCMP C216 fingerprint form that is sent to Ottawa. With CREMM-DES the
C216 is printed at the time of booking and CREMM-DES itself is a
tracking system. The saving is the time of one clerical position.
The three examples are illustrative of the benefits of CREMM-DES. The
existing manual systems have been well developed and useful. They are
simply no longer justifiable with systems such as CREMM-DES available.
Similarly the demand for staff resources elsewhere in the department
without increasing the annual budget makes CREMM-DES particularly
attractive at this time.
SOCIAL IMPLICATIONS
There is no relationship between the contemplated action and families or
children.
PERSONNEL IMPLICATIONS
Six months after implementation, the CREMM-DES project is expected to
free some staff resources in the Information Section. One CPIC clerical
position may then be used to pay for the CREMM-DES equipment.
The attached report on the Information and Privacy Unit sets out the
staffing requirements which are needed to comply with the Freedom of
Information and Protection of Privacy Act. It is believed that the
implementation of CREMM-DES will allow the Police Department to meet
those requirements without additional funding. Some variation of the
police and civilian strength of the department is required to meet the
Information and Privacy Unit's needs. Specifically, recommendation C in
this report outlines a reduction in police strength of one sergeant to
create one civilian coordinator. This change was contemplated in the
initial report to Council in June 1993. The other change converts a
civilian Warrant Squad position to a constable analyst position. This
change is necessary as a result of the volume of Freedom of Information
requests and the complexity of the work. The rationale for the strength
variations is more fully explored in the accompanying report.
FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS
CREMM-DES is supplied at no cost with no additional cost for upgrades.
The Police Department is responsible for the equipment to connect to
Ottawa and to run the system locally. The Systems Section of the Police
Department has calculated the equipment requirements as
follows:DESCRIPTION Estimated
Jail - Computers (4), Printers (2) $ 14,600
Criminal Records - Computers (7), Printers (1) $ 19,800
CPIC - Computers (1), Printers (1) $ 4,800
Charges - Computers (1), Printers (1) $ 4,800
Warrants - Computers (1), Printers (1) $ 4,800
AFIS - Computers (1), Printers (1) $ 4,800
Gateway Computer $ 2,500
Gateway Software and Ottawa End Equipment $ 16,500
DAT Tape Drive - Server backup $ 2,100
Additional Hard drive - Server $ 700
Communications Hubs (2) $ 2,500
Network Cards $ 4,000
IDN Line Installation & 2 year lease $ 4,700
Wiring supplies and installation $ 10,000
Novell Netware V3 - 25 user license $ 3,500
MS-Access Software $ 1,000
Contingency $ 5,000
Total $106,100
The Integrated Data Network, IDN, lease line is necessary until CPIC
Windows is introduced. At that time the CREMM-DES network will
integrate with the CPIC system and the lease line can be discontinued.
Additionally, until CPIC windows is introduced the department will have
to run two computers at several of the CPIC sites. Several existing
machines in the Police Department will be used as a server and work
station. About seven existing computers have to be replaced with faster
machines. The slower machines will be reallocated to continue the
Police Department's conversion to word processing and to support
reallocated staff. The cost for the equipment to implement CREMM-DES is
$106,100. The four year payback from the CPIC Clerk position is
$144,000.
Yearly cost of Civilian Coordinator $70,000
Yearly cost of Constable Analyst $64,850
$134,850
Elimination of Sergeant position $81,400
Transfer Warrant Squad position funding $53,000
$134,400
The above figures are inclusive of benefits and show a yearly shortfall
of $450 which can be accommodated within the Police Department budget.
CONCLUSION
The introduction of the CREMM-DES system will allow the Police
Department to eliminate numerous costly and redundant manual systems. As
a byproduct, the department will be able to reallocate staff to meet
obligations arising from the Freedom of Information and Protection of
Privacy Act. Funding is available for the project, six months after
implementation, from a CPIC Operator position in the Information
Section. The variations in strength in the Information and Privacy Unit
can be done for a net increase of $450 per year. The Introduction of the
CREMM-DES system can begin, immediately.
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