Oak Ridge Police Chief Jim Akagi, left, explains a new hardware and software suite that the City Council agreed to buy for the police department on Monday.
Note: This story was updated at 5:30 p.m.
A new roughly $500,000 hardware and software suite purchased for the Oak Ridge Police Department includes an electronic citation system that will allow officers to scan driver’s licenses with handheld units and quickly issue multiple citations.
The new system will save time because it will, among other things, automatically download information from the electronic tickets, including into the court system, officials said.
“It’s a lot quicker, a lot more effective,” Oak Ridge Police Chief Jim Akagi said during a January work session with the City Council.
Officials said the ability to issue tickets quicker could produce more revenue for the city and more effective law enforcement. They said it will also eliminate some problems with the current system, such as messy handwriting on paper tickets and the need to duplicate data entry in the police department and then again in the court system.
The Oak Ridge City Council agreed unanimously in a voice vote on Monday to buy the hardware and software suite, as well as technical support services, for $486,808 from Spillman Technologies Inc. of Salt Lake City, Utah.
The hardware and software suite includes a computer-aided dispatch system, or CADS; a records management system, or RMS; mobile and field reporting applications; and barcoding and scanner capabilities. It also includes the electronic, or e-ticket, capabilities and the conversion of older legacy data, as well as the first year of maintenance costs.
“It appears to meet our needs absolutely,” Oak Ridge City Manager Mark Watson said. “It does modernize our police department tremendously. It also allows us to integrate with the state system.”
Watson was referring to the Tennessee Incident Based Reporting System, or TIBRS, the state’s mandatory crime reporting system. The city’s current system is not compliant with TIBRS, and that could affect the city’s ability to get grants and state and federal assistance, Akagi told Oak Ridge City Manager Mark Watson in a Jan. 28 memo. He said efforts to get the current vendor, TriTech Inc., to help the city make its current system compliant with TIBRS have not been successful.
ORPD now pays TriTech Inc. about $80,000 in annual maintenance fees, and it would have cost about $300,000 to upgrade the system’s 15-year-old technology, Akagi told council members on Monday.
Oak Ridge will use $61,745 from a Tennessee E-911 state grant to buy the hardware and software package from Spillman Technologies, and the city will match that amount with $63,550 from the drug fund. The other $361,513 will be paid using money from the city’s Equipment Replacement Fund. Under the new contract, Akagi said, the city’s maintenance fees will be reduced by about $40,000 per year, and the savings will be used to repay the Equipment Replacement Fund, Akagi told Oak Ridge City Manager Mark Watson in a Jan. 28 memo.
Akagi said Spillman Technologies can provide the hardware, software, and improved customer service support, as well as the e-ticket capabilities, that will:
- Make ORPD TIBRS-compliant
- Improve efficiency by integrating CADS and RMS, along with mobile and field reporting capabilities
- Enhance statistical reporting and crime analysis capabilities, including tactical and strategic functions through direct integration with ORPD’s current crime analysis software
- Improve the efficiency of traffic enforcement and ORPD administrative reporting functions, as well as increase efficiency of Municipal Court functions through integrated software downloading
The system will also integrate with the police department’s RAIDS Online crime mapping system from BAIR Analytics.
Among the other services to be provided are:
- Automated vehicle locator
- CADS mapping
- Traffic information
- Imaging
- Evidence management
- Automated field reporting
- Mobile mapping
- Voiceless dispatch
- E911 interface
- Smartphone and tablet interface
- Mobile queries of state, national, and local records databases
Also Monday, the Oak Ridge Emergency Communication District board approved a $481,567 purchase from the 911 budget to buy and install dispatch equipment as part of the state’s new 911 network (Next Generation 911). All purchases will be reimbursed under the Tennessee Emergency Communications Board grant program, officials said.
ORPD Capt. Mike Uher said the equipment is grant-funded and required by the state, and it will talk to other equipment across the state.
Jason Allison says
Crybabies in…….3……….2……….1
Sandi Goldberg says
Now now Jason, not being a crybaby just curious. How would the person getting the ticket, well, get the ticket? Do they get a printout somehow? How does that part work?
Jason Allison says
Seeing as this article didn’t go into that detail I’m left to assume, and we know what that could mean. With the equipment upgrades I would have to imagine that the offender would get a printout just as they would a normal hand written one. I have a feeling this would work both ways. It will help the justice system and would also aid the accused. Most of the time you cannot read the hand writing of the officer, just a human thing. Sometimes being able to positively ID the issuing officer helps the accused in court and could possibly weed out the tickets that fall in the grey area
Jason Allison says
And wanting to know the details is not crying
johnhuotari says
Sandi, during the City Council meeting last week, Chief Akagi said the e-citation system would include a handheld unit and printer that would scan a driver’s license, automatically fill in information, and allow the officer to select the applicable charges before the offender signs. The officer would then deliver the citation, Akagi said.
I believe officers now have to write citations one at a time, so the new system is expected to significantly decrease the time required to write tickets, particularly for multiple violations.
Helen Standifer says
Boys and their toys. Tsk, Tsk