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November / December 2011
Volume 23, Number 6

News you can use

Counties develop Juvenile Case Management System Software Available for Purchase

For the first time in Texas, two counties began sharing a common juvenile justice database in September with the rollout of a new, jointly developed software program. Tarrant and Dallas Counties have joined together to implement the Juvenile Case Management System (JCMS), which can track individuals entered into the database by either county.

“This is a major accomplishment and a great milestone achieved,” said Tarrant County Administrator G.K. Maenius. “We have been able to develop a major software package that is specifically designed for Texas Juvenile Probation programs.”

The JCMS has three benefits. First, now both counties can see database information across jurisdictions – allowing juvenile justice officials of one county the ability to determine if an individual has records in the other county. Second, it streamlines the operations of juvenile probation in both counties – decreasing paperwork and increasing person-to-person contacts. Third, counties have the ability to allow local law enforcement agencies to access the database.

“We have limited our development costs by partnering with Dallas and Bexar counties, along with the Texas Juvenile Probation Commission,” said Maenius. Bexar County will use the software but will not be sharing the same database as the other two counties.

“Because we own the software and other Juvenile Probation departments across the State want this software, we will be able to sell it to them. This will result in literally millions of dollars in savings for Tarrant County because we will be sharing the development costs with other participating entities,” he said.

The JCMS is part of the TechShare program, a major effort involving the state’s most populous counties to develop a common justice information system that can be used throughout Texas. In 2005, Tarrant County initiated the effort through the Texas Conference of Urban Counties, which has been working to develop the standards and build systems that meet the unique needs of Texas counties. Tarrant has maintained a leadership role in the TechShare program, providing much of the technical support in the development of entirely new software programs.

Earlier this year, the TechShare Program received a national Digital Government Achievement Award from the Center for Electronic Government for its intergovernmental cooperation.

Counties that are not part of the Techshare agreement and have not contributed to the software development are still able to purchase the software; the money is distributed to the original Techshare counties.