WSR 15-01-016

RULES OF COURT

[December 3, 2014]

The Judicial Information System Committee, having recommended the adoption of the proposed amendments to JISCR 13—Electronic Court Record Systems, and the Court having considered the amendments and comments submitted thereto, and having determined that the proposed amendments will aid in the prompt and orderly administration of justice;

Now, therefore, it is hereby

(a) That pursuant to the provisions of GR 9(g), the proposed amendments as shown below are to be published for comment in the Washington Reports, Washington Register, Washington State Bar Association and Administrative Office of the Court's websites expeditiously.

(b) The purpose statement as required by GR 9(e), is published solely for the information of the Bench, Bar and other interested parties.

(c) Comments are to be submitted to the Clerk of the Supreme Court by either U.S. Mail or Internet E-Mail by no later than 30 days from the published date. Comments may be sent to the following addresses: P.O. Box 40929, Olympia, Washington 98504-0929, or supreme@courts.wa.gov. Comments submitted by e-mail message must be limited to 1500 words.

DATED at Olympia, Washington this 3rd day of December, 2014.

 

Proposal to Amend Judicial Information System Committee Rule 13

Concerning Local Court Systems

Purpose:

JISCR 13 (effective May 15, 1976) requires counties or cities wishing to establish automated court record systems to provide 90 days' notice of the proposed development to the Judicial Information System Committee (JISC) and the Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) for review and approval.

The proposed rule defines "electronic court record system," clarifies that JISC approval is required for all electronic court record systems, provides for increased notice of proposed systems, and requires courts with alternative electronic court record systems to comply with the JIS Data Standards for Alternative Electronic Court Record Systems.

On March 28, 2011, the JISC and the State Court Administrator received a letter from Spokane Municipal Court requesting approval to purchase JustWare software from New Dawn Technologies (see attached letter from Judge Tracy Staab, March 28, 2011).

The District Court Information System (DISCIS) is the current statewide person-centric court case management system used at the Courts of Limited Jurisdiction (CLJ) level. DISCIS is used for initiating case filing for well-identified persons and CLJ cases. It is also used to manage persons, case-related financial activities, CLJ calendaring and to perform other functions including delinquent payment processing.

The JIS is the designated statewide repository for criminal and domestic violence case histories. A complete case and person history is essential to the business of the courts for judicial decisions regarding public safety. Therefore, all Washington State Municipal, District, and Superior Courts are required to enter cases into JIS for the purpose of providing a central, statewide data repository for criminal and domestic violence related information.

References: RCW 26.50.070(5), 7.90.120, 10.95.045.

The JISC first discussed Spokane Municipal Court's request at their May 6, 2011 meeting (see attached JISC History on Spokane Municipal Request and JIS Local CMS Policy, 2011-2012). The JISC agreed to consider Spokane's request at its next meeting, June 24, 2011. AOC provided key questions for discussion and responses from Spokane in areas including: the alternate system's unique functionality, data sharing, data integrity, security, and technical requirements (see attached Spokane Municipal Court Request for Approval to Implement a Local Automated Court Record System, May 11, 2011). AOC also provided an analysis and cost estimates for three options for data transfer from Spokane's system to the statewide system (see attached Spokane Municipal Court to Implement a Local Court Management System Options, June 24, 2011).

Option One:

AOC would prioritize the creation of a nightly batch transfer for Spokane, ahead of previously approved and prioritized IT Governance projects. This was estimated to take 1,400 hours of AOC staff time, 6-12 months to complete, and at a cost to AOC of $100,000.

Option Two:

Spokane would continue its implementation of JustWare, and commit to continuing to enter the full set of required data separately into JIS (which may grow and change over time) until an expanded data transfer was available.

Option Three:

Spokane would defer implementation of its separate JustWare system until expanded data transfer was complete.

AOC recommended Option Two or Option Three, and not Option One, as it would prioritize this over other projects that had already been approved through the IT Governance process, and would provide limited data to other courts in the state, updated once every 24 hours, which could pose a safety risk.

AOC also outlined unanswered policy questions:

1. Who bears the cost of taking the court off JIS?

2. Who bears the cost of putting the court back on if it decides to come back later?

3. If there are differences of opinion as to fee splits or other things, whose opinion rules?

The JISC voted to defer a decision until its August 5, 2011 meeting, and also to form an ad hoc workgroup to propose a draft policy on implementation of local court systems for JISC approval.

The JISC Policy Workgroup on Implementation of Local Court Systems met twice in August, but was not prepared to propose a policy to the JISC in August. The decision on the policy and on Spokane's request was deferred until October 7, 20011. In the interim, AOC had numerous meetings with Spokane to understand their data exchange issues and how to make it work.

On August 16, 2011, Spokane Municipal Court sent a letter to Justice Mary E. Fairhurst stating that they had chosen to proceed with Option Two, and that they planned to proceed with implementation of their own local system. Option Two: Commit to continuing to enter the full set of required data (emphasis added) separately into JIS (which may grow and change over time) until the generic expanded data transfer (ITG #27) is available for use (see attached letter from Judge Mary Logan, August 16, 2011).

At their September 9, 2011 meeting, the JISC decided to send Spokane a letter clarifying the JISC position on Spokane's request.

On September 21, 2011 Justice Fairhurst, on behalf of the JISC, sent a letter to Judge Mary Logan, Spokane Municipal Court Presiding Judge, acknowledging that the JISC was not in a position to approve or deny Spokane's request because "there is not currently a corresponding policy in place to provide the necessary guidance and conditions to support an individual court's efforts to implement a non-JIS system, while ensuring the integrity of data and information upon which all courts depend." The letter went on to state, "the JISC feels it is prudent to inform you of the possible risks associated with implementing a local court system that has not been vetted in advance by the AOC to certify that it meets a predetermined set of business and technical standards. If problems are discovered at a later time, it could potentially be quite costly to you to make the needed corrections." (See attached letter to Judge Mary Logan, September 21, 2011).

On December 14, 2011, Pierce County opted out of the Superior Court Case Management System (SC-CMS) project, opting to retain their existing separate case management system, LINX (see attached letter to Judge Bryan Chushcoff, December 14, 2011).

In November 2012, AOC became aware that Spokane Municipal Court did not plan to enter complete data into JIS, as they had agreed in their August 18, 2011 letter. Justice Fairhurst and Callie Dietz, the State Court Administrator, sent a letter to Spokane Municipal Court on December 3, 2012, warning that "this decision can have significant consequences, including jeopardizing the Administrative Office of the Court's ability to produce consistent statewide caseload reports and to provide estimates of judicial need." (See attached letter to Judge Mary Logan, December 3, 2012). Spokane responded December 13, 2012, stating that the court intended to do double-data entry, but not each event, citing as an example the limited case information sent from Seattle Municipal Court to JIS (see attached letter to Justice Fairhurst and Callie Dietz, December 13, 2012). Since Spokane Municipal implemented its JustWare system in 2013, Spokane has entered significantly less than the full set of data into JIS. In particular, hearing date information and accounting information are missing. Subsequently, AOC received information from Spokane District Court indicating numerous difficulties created because Spokane Municipal Court was not entering hearing information.

The JISC Policy Workgroup on Implementation of Local Court Systems continued to meet through 2011 and 2012 with the purpose of developing first a policy and then amendments to JISCR 13, but could not come to consensus. The draft policy contained references to an AOC data standard that would detail the data elements required for courts on local systems to share with the statewide system. On June 22, 2012, the workgroup brought majority and minority drafts to the JISC, declared it had reached an impasse, and requested direction from the JISC. The JISC gave the workgroup direction as to several questions, but did not approve either raft. The JISC ordered the workgroup to continue its work and bring a revised draft back to the committee (see attached summary of JISC minutes). The workgroup met through November 2012, but still could not reach consensus. The workgroup then became dormant, until it was finally disbanded in 2014. Having been unable to reach consensus on the policy, the workgroup never addressed the planned amendments to JISCR 13. Because a policy was never passed, the accompanying AOC data standards were also never passed.

In late 2013, AOC became aware that several other courts were pursuing independent local systems, including King County District Court, Yakima County District Court, and Federal Way Municipal Court, in addition to Seattle Municipal Court and Spokane Municipal Court, which already had separate local systems. Representatives of the District and Municipal Court Judges' Association, the District and Municipal Court Management Association, and AOC met on January 24, 2014, to discuss the courts' future plans for independent systems, and the impact on the statewide court information database. If all of these courts of limited jurisdiction leave the statewide system, there must be data standards in place so that their information is visible to other courts and justice partners.

On January 27, 2014, AOC received a letter from King County Superior Court declaring that they were withdrawing from the SC-CMS project (see attached letter from Judge Craighead, January 27, 2014). When King County Superior Court implements its own case management system, there will be a need for King County Superior Court's information to continue to be in the statewide system. Without it, there will be a significant gap in the case information available statewide.

In the 2014 Supplemental Budget, the legislature attached the following proviso to AOC's funding for the Superior:

The administrative office of the courts and the judicial information systems committee shall develop statewide superior court data collection and exchange standards. Upon implementation, these standards must be met by each superior court in order to continue to receive judicial information systems account funding or equipment and services funded by the account.

For those courts that do not use the statewide superior court vendor solution as chosen by the judicial information systems committee, judicial information systems account funds may not be allocated for (a) the costs to meet the data collection and exchange standards developed by administrative office of the courts and judicial information systems committee, and (b) the costs to develop and implement local court case management systems.

Responding to the legislature's direction for superior courts, as well as the growing need to ensure the integrity of statewide information for courts of limited jurisdiction, the JISC passed JIS Data Standards for Alternative Court Record Systems and the accompanying Implementation Plan on October 24, 2014 (see attached data standards and implementation plan).

The proposed amended JISC Rule 13 was distributed to JISC members and stakeholders on August 25, 2014, for consideration at the September 5 JISC meeting. Justice Fairhurst received numerous requests to delay consideration of the proposed rule. At the September 5th meeting, the JISC agreed to delay the decision until their October 24th meeting, and had a lengthy discussion about the proposed rule. Justice Fairhurst requested written comments from members.

After receiving suggestions and comments, Justice Fairhurst sent a revised version of the rule to JISC members on September 29, with a request for comments by October 7. More comments were received from members and court stakeholders. A final proposed version of the rule was sent to JISC members and stakeholders on October 13, 2014 for the October 24 JISC meeting. Shortly before the meeting, Justice Fairhurst again received requests to delay a decision on JISCR 13. When the JISC member requesting more time was asked how much more time would be needed, the response was six months.

On October 24, 2014, the JISC approved the proposed amendment to JISCR 13 to include the language in the first paragraph of the legislative proviso above, and made it applicable to both superior and limited jurisdiction courts. The JISC's rationale is to give the JISC authority to enforce the new data standards for courts with independent systems by tying compliance with JIS funding, as the legislature did in its 2014 budget proviso. As more limited jurisdictions contemplate using alternative systems, it is also necessary to ensure the integrity of statewide information for all courts (see attached excerpt from draft minutes, JISC October 24, 2014 meeting).

On October 24, the JISC also added the second paragraph of the legislative proviso to its JIS General Policies, ensuring that JIS funds would not be used for costs for local systems or for those systems to meet the data standards. (See attached JIS General Policy 10.2).

The proposed rule defines "electronic court record system," clarifies that JISC approval is required for all electronic court record systems, provides for increased notice of proposed systems, and requires courts with alternative electronic court record systems to comply with the JIS Data Standards for Alternative Electronic Court Record Systems.