Cooperation makes county’s work easier

Jefferson County, Colo., employees have communication and organizational technology at their fingertips. ore than 800 PCs and terminals assist daily in county operations, thanks to three departments’ work and innovations. The Management Information Systems (MIS), Network Services and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) departments all work together to make the county’s advanced computing environment possible. The three departments assist more than 2,300 employees in a diverse county that covers 777 square miles of urban, suburban, rural and mountain areas and is home to nearly half-a-million people. “We all work together in support of customers,” says MIS Director Don Vernon.

MIS provides application development and specialized programming for all operations. All software, personalized to departmental needs, is copyrighted and trademarked. Large computer systems sit with blinking red and green lights in the card-code-access computer room, while smaller servers are located in offices throughout the organization. The systems provide computer service to 42 buildings, including the Administration and Courts Facility, Health and Environment Department, District Attorney’s Office and the jail. For example, the scanning systems used at the Clerk and Recorder’s Office and the jail make storing documents easier and more efficient. In the past, all recorded documents were stored on microfilm. When a copy was needed, the film would be sent out for processing, with copies available the next day. Now, documents are scanned and connected to further information about the transaction. After this process, a document copy can be produced in minutes. The system also makes this public record information easily accessible to citizens.

Additionally, MIS has developed an automated telephone system for the Treasurer’s Office, which supplies information to citizens enabling them to call in and, using a touch-tone telephone, access property assessments, values and taxes. Also, during election time, it informs citizens of their correct polling places. About 300 phone calls a day are handled by the automated system.

With the rate of technological change ever increasing, keeping up is the department’s main challenge. Major changes in operating requirements are now taking place. The department is working on ways to develop applications faster as demand grows. “There have been more changes in the past five years than I’ve seen in the last 40,” Vernon says. Network Services provides dial tone, video, login, e-mail and voice mail when needed. The department also offers “commodity software” support, installation, upgrading, set-up and training.

“We have made great strides in creating a unified Jefferson County Information Network to allow universal access to information for all employees using the network,” says Director of Network Services Steve O’Brien.

The department’s Help Desk handles county employees’ frustrations, especially with a network conversion taking place now — from Novell 3.1 to Novell 4.1. Its 16 employees have received in-depth cross-training and spend time working on network engineering, design and maintenance. They find ways to make it work and keep it working. “I am proud of the amount of training our staff is receiving,” says O’Brien. “We are ahead of other entities in this area.” Netscape has been installed on each user’s workstation to provide access to both the Internet and the county’s Intranet. The department is also working on the design of a data warehouse.

The GIS department provides decision support using the best technology currently available for land planning, crime analysis, visual resource identification and modeling regional transportation issues. Other departments are able to make better decisions because the GIS department gives them accurate, useful information when they want it, where they want it. “We help with day-to-day decision making, resulting in better planning and development with consideration for all factors,” says GIS Director David Gallaher. For example, high speed scanners have been purchased to save the money and time it would cost an employee to enter the detailed and intricate information now easily scanned.

Also, an addressing file, developed and updated along with MIS, ensures that addressing information is accurate and available to county departments, private entities and citizens. Like the MIS software, the databases developed by the GIS department are copyrighted to protect the taxpayers’ investment.

GIS specialists can assist with collecting, managing and using location-based information to analyze trends, develop projections and design spatial models for land use, planning, environmental management, transportation, water resources, geology, archaeology, air quality and hazardous sites. The 15 GIS employees are ready to assist in all phases of project design and implementation, including user needs assessment, hardware/software configuration, software development, database development, remote sensing and the production of useful information.

The three computing service departments within Jefferson County work together, sharing GIS and MIS data and innovations to make computing systems work to benefit the county and its citizens and to connect the county to the world.

This article was written by Laura Griffith, an intern with the Jefferson County, Colo., Public Information Department.