Building an effective data tracking system for public safety is a massive undertaking that should not be taken lightly. The intention of the Hawaii Public Safety Department’s IT (information technology) contract, and the progress made with it, have been mischaracterized and misunderstood (“No Opens in a new tab quick Opens in a new tabfix Opens in a new tab,” Star-Advertiser, June 30). Permit me to provide some perspective, as I was the PSD director when the contract with the university’s Research and Evaluation in Public Safety (REPS) program was issued.
It is unfair to misconstrue this major undertaking as a failure because it did not result in a new software system. That was never the intent of the project. Instead, the main purpose was to help PSD implement the Justice Reinvestment Initiative, which was adopted by the Legislature in 2012. JRI is a data-driven approach which requires evidence-based approaches and decision-making.
During my term as director, I became painfully aware that the department was woefully unprepared for JRI, in large part because we simply could not extract meaningful information from the existing information systems. We had nearly 90 separate and independent data systems. These stand-alone systems were developed by individual programs over the years because of their frustrations with OffenderTrak, which was purchased off-the-shelf in the late 1990s.
As a result, we were not using evidence-based information to make meaningful decisions, including inmate classification, facility placement and programming decisions. For example, decisions to transfer an inmate from one facility to another were often not coordinated with their participation in substance abuse or educational programs.
We needed a comprehensive assessment of the department’s nearly 90 separate and independent data systems to determine how to create a pathway to one unified corrections information management system that could inform the decisions we had to make. We needed to map out a process to identify all the key decision points and identify the data needed at those crucial points. This would drive the software, instead of vice versa.
While JRI was the impetus, the antiquated information system impacted all aspects of the corrections operations. For example, OffenderTrak could not communicate with systems operated by the Hawaii Judiciary or PSD’s Sheriff Division, which led to serious issues related to court appearances and release of inmates. I recall receiving frequent calls from judges complaining that detained defendants had not been transported to court by OCCC (Oahu Community Correctional Center) for their scheduled court appearances. I learned that mix-ups occurred because OCCC used a completely manual process to determine which of its more than 1,000 inmates had to appear in which of six Oahu courts at a specified time on a given day.
The primitive systems also impacted the release of inmates. We sometimes released inmates too early or held them too long. One of the reasons for these errors was our information system’s inability to integrate the data when an inmate was held on more than one court order. Instead, everything — from sentencing information to court appearances to release dates — was inputted manually, requiring valuable staff time. The outmoded system was literally an accident waiting to happen, and believe me, we had more than a few “accidents.”
It is easy to take potshots at those who accepted the daunting challenge of fixing a large government agency’s aging IT system. It would have been easy just to buy another off-the-shelf system and try to adapt it to our needs. These approaches never work and are often much more costly than the initial investment. The intent of this massive undertaking of IT contract was to prevent the relentless cycle of ill-conceived, Band-aid IT solutions made over the past several decades so that the department staff can better manage those entrusted to the corrections systems.
Ted Sakai is former director of the state Department of Public Safety (1998 to 2002, and 2012-14).
