August 31, 2006

City approves electronic citation system for police department

The City Council unanimously approved the purchase of a 3iInfoTech electronic citation system for the San Jose Police Department at its Tuesday, Aug. 29 meeting. The electronic machine will streamline tickets and enhance the department’s ability to look up information, said Chief Rob Davis.

The device, including installation, hardware, software, one year of maintenance/support, professional services and shipping and taxes, will cost $782,320. Additional costs include a contingency amount of $36,680 for increases in initial volume or unanticipated requirements. The city also will execute purchase orders for additional quantities of handheld devices, printers and software licenses at the same unit contract price over a five-year period after the date of the initial award, subject to annual appropriations, as well as four added one-year options to renew software maintenance, subject to annual appropriations.

The new device eliminates the need for data entry into several different systems created by paper tickets and provides fewer errors since it will not have to be re-keyed into different systems. It also will reduce labor-intensive hand searches to retrieve the tickets offering more efficiency.

The device can scan a driver’s license, automatically filling in the name, address and information such as the date and time of the citation. The machines are already being used in Santa Cruz and Daly City, and both cities claim increased efficiency.

“The new devices will allow us to check on the impact of traffic,” said Davis. “We don’t have the ability now to figure out how many accidents happen at a certain place. The device will allow us to do that.”

Although several council members cited concerns about using an electronic signature in these days of identity theft, Davis explained that there are privacy strategies including firewalls and “several layers of security” to prevent that from happening.

“It’s a lot easier for that to happen now,” said Lt. Rueben Chavez, “with three copies of the [paper] citation.”