SR-05131986-6V~-v
M(AY i 3 1986
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FD:CMD:lh:datacomr
Council Meeting: May 13, 1986
Santa Monica, California
TO: MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL
FROM: City Staff
SUBJECT: RECOMMENDATION TO AUTHORIZE THE CITY MANAGER TO
NEGOTIATE AND EXECUTE AN AGREEMENT WITH DATACOM
SYSTEMS FOR THE PROCESSING OF PARKING CITATIONS
Introduction
This report recommends that the City Council authorize the City
Manager to negotiate and execute an agreement with DATACOM
SYSTEMS for the processing of City parking citations.
Background
Under State law, the Santa Monica Municipal Court is responsible
for the processing of parking citations. However several years
ago the City agreed to use City staff to assist the Court in
fulfilling this responsibility. This assistance consists of:
a) four clerical staff stationed at the courthouse who open mail,
prepare payments and dismissals for data entry, answer telephone
inquiries, file reports and assist court staff at the bail
window, and b) data processing staff who perform all associated
data processing activities. In consideration for this assistance
provided by City staff, the Court only retains 11% of net parking
citation revenues paid to the court to cover its costs after
processing various deductions as required under State law:
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MAY ~ 3 198i
$3.00/issued citation for court construction costs and
$1.00/vehicle registration placed on hold with the State
Department of Motor Vehicles for non-payment of a parking
citation.
Attached to this staff report is a more detailed listing of the
processing functions currently performed by City and Court staff
and how these processing functions would be distributed should
the City contract with DATACOM SYSTEMS.
Improvements Needed in Processing Functions Performed by the City
Since parking citation payments constitute a major revenue source
to the City, during the Spring of 1984, staff performed a
preliminary review of all processing functions performed by the
City. As a result of that preliminary study, in June 1984
Council authorized contracting with Coopers & Lybrand, a major
accounting and management/systems consulting firm, to review the
entire processing system thoroughly to identify ways to improve
processing efficiency, reduce costs and possibly increase
revenues.
Coopers & Lybrand completed its review in December 1984 and
recommended that major system improvements could be realized by
replacing the City's existing parking citation data processing
system. Several years ago City staff developed the current City
automated parking citation system. It is a batch system which is
very cumbersome, inefficient and system documentation is missing.
For example, the system does not produce adequate and reliable
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management reports necessary to monitor the operation. Further,
the system does not have on-line inquiry capabilities. This
means that if a citizen makes an in person or telephone inquiry
about a citation such as "I want to pay for all of my tickets.
How much do I owe?" or "I thought I paid for this ticket. What do
your records show?", these questions require manual look-up,
resulting in questions going unanswered or staff spending up to
30 minutes per citation investigating the matter.
Efforts to Improve Svstem Operations
A City implementation team was formed consisting of staff from
the City Manager's office and Information Systems and Finance
Departments. Research was done to locate a replacement
application software package. It was determined, however, that
none existed for purchase which would serve the operational and
management needs of the City of Santa Monica due to the size of
our parking citation operation. The City issues approximately
350,000 citations annually. Efforts therefore were focused on
the development of a new City parking citation system under the
direction of City staff. However by the Fall of 1985 staff
determined that DATACOM SYSTEMS, a company that was selected by
competitive bidding to process parking citations for Los Angeles
County, had a system in place that would meet the needs of the
City of Santa Monica. DATACOM has implemented a similar system
for the City of Los Angeles and is currently processing Santa
Monica College Parking Citations for the Santa Monica Municipal
Court.
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Recommendation to Contract with DATACOM SYSTEMS
During the last few months, staff have closely monitored DATACOM
SYSTEMS' implementation and operation of both the Los Angeles
County and City automated parking citation processing systems.
Additionally, staff have recently completed a thorough program
and on-site review of the DATACOM SYSTEMS operation for the
County of Los Angeles and determined, at this time, that
DATACOM'S Los Angeles County system best meets the City's parking
citation data processing needs. Since the City of Santa Monica
would be purchasng the same services already bid and awarded to
DATACOM SYSTEMS by the County of Los Angeles, at this time the
Council only needs to authorize the City Manager to negotiate and
enter into an appropriate agreement with DATACOM SYSTEMS.
Budget/Financial Impact
Preliminary inquiries with DATACOM SYSTEMS indicates that the
cost for their processing the approximately 350,000 parking
citations annually issued by the City would be $296,000/year.
Contracting with DATACOM SYSTEMS will substantially improve the
efficiency and effectiveness of the data processing aspects of
parking citation processing. Efficiency will be improved
because: a) existing City computer hardware, and programming and
data entry support valued at over $80,000/yr. can be shifted to
other higher priority City data processing needs, b) the City's
computer systems will not experience a response time decline
which would result from operating a substantially revised parking
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citation system on our own computer equipment, (the computer
systems used by the City are designed to handle large volume
on-line transaction processing, not large volume batch
processing), and c) system development costs can be avoided. If
the City were to elect to go to a stand-alone system for
processing parking citations the hardware cost would be
approximately $130,000. Further, two City data entry operators
currently process parking citations. With the overall data
processing function transferred to DATACOM SYSTEMS, one data
entry operator position will be transferred to the Police
Department where it will be responsibile for maintaining a new
automated system for tracking moving violations and traffic
accidents records. This transfer will be reflected in the
proposed FY 1986/87 budget. The second data entry operator
position will be retained in the Information Systems department
to perform other data entry functions.
City parking citation effectiveness, in terms of increased
parking citation revenues, is expected to result from DATACOM
SYSTEMS performing the City's parking citation-related data
processing functions. This is primarily because DATACOM SYSTEMS
will be able to send follow-up notifications to violators more
quickly when they fail to pay. Studies have indicated that the
shorter this time period, the higher is the percentage of
violators that ultimately pay their violations. Further, some
additional interest would be earned on the cash which would be
received more quickly. For FY1986/87 it is estimated that
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parking citation revenues would conservatively increase by
approximately $360,000 due to more timely processing procedures
resulting from a processing contract with DATACOM SYSTEMS.
Finally, in addition to the cost avoidances and increased
revenues resulting in a net benefit to City operations, the level
of service to the public will increase primarily through DATACOM
SYSTEMS' on-line inquiry capabilities.
Sufficient appropriation authority to contract with DATACOM
SYSTEMS will be included in the FY1986/87 proposed budget.
Recommendation
It is recommended that the City Council authorize the City
Manager to negotiate and execute an agreement with DATACOM
SYSTEMS for the processing of City parking citations.
Prepared by: Mike Dennis, Director of Finance
Toby Menin, Collections Manager
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FUNCTIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES FOR THE PROCESSING OF
CITY PARKING CITATIONS
Current Responsibilities
Responsibilities Under
Datacom Contract
City Processing Clerical Staff
Open mail
Prepare payments & dismissals
for data entry
Answer phones
File issued citations
File paid citations
File reports
Assist at bail window
County Court Staff
City Processing Clerical Staff
No change
No change
No change
Datacom staff
Datacom staff
No change
No change
County Court Staff
Receive payments at bail window No change
Schedule Court appearances No change
Conduct Court trials No change
Deposit revenue No change
Distribute revenue No change
Send out form letters Datacom staff
City Data Processing Staff
Batch and key issued citations
Batch and key payments
& dismissals
Produce management reports
Interface with DMV*
Produce and mail notices*
Maintain automated system*
City Data Processing Staff
Datacom staff
Datacom staff
Datacom staff
Datacom staff
Datacom staff
Datacom staff
*A weekly tape is sent to DMV containing vehicle information;
either license plate or vehicle identification number (vin). DMV
responds with name and address of the registered owner. If the
citation is not paid, a "Notice of Illegal Parking and Intention
to Notify Department of Motor Vehicles" is mailed to the
registered owner.
Failure to respond to the notice by posting bail causes a record
to be sent to DMV which results in the withholding of vehicle
registration renewal. Subsequent payment causes a record to be
sent to DMV releasing the vehicle and allowing renewal of
registration.
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Reference Contract
No. 4683 (CCS).