AGENDA CAPTION:
Title
Consider approval of Ordinance 2020-55, on the first of two readings, amending the City’s 2019-2020 Fiscal Year Budget to allocate $148,250.00 from the Municipal Court Technology Fund to provide funding for an updated Municipal Court Case Management System and expansion of the City’s Ticket Writing System; and declaring an effective date.
Body
Meeting date: August 4, 2020
Department: Finance Department with the Municipal Court
Amount & Source of Funding
Funds Required: $148,250 (integration, implementation, and 1-year maintenance)
Account Number: 12023000-42025
Funds Available: $203,159.76 Click or tap here to enter text.
Account Name: Municipal Court Technology Fund.
Fiscal Note:
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Background Information:
These projects were appropriated in the Fiscal Year 2019 Budget. However, there were no contracts signed by the end of the Fiscal Year, thus the appropriation simply closed to the Municipal Court Technology Fund reserves and must now be re-appropriated.
During Fiscal Year 2020 the stakeholders have been working on the options. The Municipal Court administers the Court Case Management System. Through 2020, the Court, in partnership with the Information Technology Department and the Purchasing Division, reviewed and analyzed two major systems. They selected the Vertosoft LLC system. The Vertosoft system costs $95,000 with an additional $3,250 necessary to build some integrations with other applications.
The Ticket Writing request is an expansion of the City’s Brazos Ticketwriter system currently used by our Police Department. This project will permit Park Rangers, Animal Control, Fire Marshal, and Code Enforcement employees to also use the system. A total of 31 additional licenses will be purchased for these departments; another 48 licenses will be purchased and assigned to the Police Department to ensure all officers can now use the automated ticketing system. The total cost of the ticketing expansion will be approximately $80,000.
The ticketing project expenditures include additional hardware and integration costs.
The importance of this project is these departments are manually writing tickets, then the tickets have to be entered into the court’s case management system. Purchasing an automated system will permit all tickets to be automatically loaded and managed in the Court Case system.
The Municipal Court Technology Fund has a balance of over $215,000 as of July, 2020. The Fund’s revenue source is based on a $4 fee on all court-imposed adjudications. Because we have not completed Fiscal Year 2020, the known beginning fund balance of $203,159.76 was illustrated as available funds.
The Court Case Software has a first-year cost of $98,250, including integration and all other project costs. There is an estimated annual maintenance cost of $20,911.00 for an additional four years for a total five-year contract term. This money will be appropriated in the 2021 Budget.
The Ticket Writing software is budgeted for a total cost of $80,000. However, $30,000 of this cost is already appropriated in the Police Department’s Capital Outlay budget. The $50,000 needed balance will, again, be appropriated from the Municipal Court Technology Fund. Future
maintenance for the software will be budgeted in the appropriate Funds.
Sources and Uses
|
Sources |
Fund |
Amount |
Total |
|
|
Municipal Court Technology Fund |
$148,250 |
|
|
|
Police Department Capital Outlay |
30,000 |
|
|
Total Sources |
|
|
$178,250 |
|
Uses |
Municipal Court Case Management Software |
$98,250 |
|
|
|
Ticket Writing Software Expansion |
80,000 |
|
|
Total Uses |
|
|
$178,250 |
Council Committee, Board/Commission Action:
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Alternatives:
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Recommendation:
Staff members recommend the appropriation of $148,250.00 from the Municipal Court Technology Fund in order to complete the contracts for the Municipal Court Case Management system and the Ticket Writing expansion application.