Minutes Region 4 Meeting
Monday, May 2, 2016
Brown County Law Enforcement Center
Attendees:
Rich Meyer, Brown County
Jean Prochniak, Brown County
Crystal Campos, Carver County
Darren Esser, Faribault County
Lynn Krachmer, Faribault County
John L. Thompson, Faribault County
Jason McCaslin, Jackson County
James Forshee, Martin County
Steven McDonald, Martin County
Mike Sheplee, Martin County
Dan Whitman, Martin County
Farley Grunig, MCCC
Lisa Meredith, MCCC
Dayle Moore Nicollet County
Katie Purdham, Nobles County
Laura Hacker, Sibley County
Charlene Pelletier, Sibley County
Marilee Peterson, Sibley County
The Region 4 meeting was called to order at 10:00 am by Dan Whitman and introductions were made. The proposed agenda was approved with a motion from John Thompson/Faribault and a second by Lynn Krachmer/Faribault. The minutes from the 2015 meeting were approved with a motion from Jim Forshee/Martin and Jason McCaslin/Jackson seconding.
Lisa Meredith provided information about the annual conference which has the theme “Building Blocks of Collaboration”. The schedule has gone out and it contains numerous meetings. Binders will be provided to attendees as well as an app being available. FGG want their elections changed to the annual meeting in the future.
Finance and General Government representative elections were held. Lisa Meredith gave a description of the duties of the committee. John Thompson/Faribault nominated Cindy Schultz/McLeod. Jim Forshee/Faribault moved that nominations cease and aunanimous ballot be cast for Cindy. Dayle Moore/Nicolletseconded the motion. The motion passed. John Thompson/Faribault nominated Jim Forshee/Faribault. Jason McCaslin/Jackson moved that nominations cease and a unanimous ballot be cast for Jim. Laura Hacker/Sibley seconded the motion. The motion passed.
Lisa Meredith presented the 2015 Audit Report. Printed copies were made available. A concern about sales tax on a MnCCC custom software is being reviewed.
The proposed 2017 Budget was presented by Lisa with an overall increase of 6.39%. It is proposed to increase the maximum-per-county-cap to $7,500. 23 counties are currently at the cap. The budget will be voted on at the annual conference.
A policy has been established and adopted by the MnCCC Board for contract ratification. In 2014 the bylaws were changed to allow for email ballots. Several County attorneys were concerned about the open meeting law. So, each user group will be allowed to decide if they want to have emailed ballots. We will not have a past chair this year due to retirement. It is proposed that the immediate past chair serve an additional term as past chair. This will be voted upon at the annual meeting.
Last year, vendor contract guidelines were approved. These are posted in the MnCCC resource center.
RSVP is used by MnCCC to track over 600 meetings per year. It will be taking on a new look this year.
Status reports for each user group were reviewed:
Community Health Service
Corrections
Law Enforcement
Information Services Support Group
County Attorney
Xerox Tax
Thomson Reuters Tax
CAMA
PTM Project Report
Finance and General Government
JIC
Property Information User Group
Tax Court
Case Works
Discussion was held regarding holding the regional meetings in-person as only the ISSG, CAMA, FGG and Tax user groups seem to attend. Lynn Krachmer/Faribault moved to change all elections to be held at the annual meeting. Concern was shared about people being able to review what was going to be voted on at the annual meeting. It was suggested to have a pre-conference webinar statewide to review the material prior to the conference and no longer have the in-person region meetings.
RichMeyer/Brown moved to adjourn. John Thompson/Faribault seconded the motion. The meeting was adjourned at 12:17 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Marilee J. Peterson
Attachments – User Group Reports:
CHS:
·Transitioning into our 9 month contract year to place us back onto a calendar year cycle with M&S. User Group has decided to sunset the AS/400 platform as of 12/31/2018. All agencies still on the AS/400 platform need to convert to SQL Database before that date. This transition will save us costs of double programming, double release preparation and double testing, for programming changes impacting the database that we face now by supporting two platforms.
·Continue to make progress on grant projects including: PCORI research and WRCC SIM Case Management (PCORI = Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute) (WRCC = Winona Regional Care Coordination) (SIM = Statewide Improvement Model). Latest release in Beta testing with expected late May, Early June general release. Sandlot ceased operations and left the User Group with $26,776 in unpaid outstanding invoices for programming under contract. The Finance Committee and User Group are reviewing for next steps.
Corrections:
Juvenile Intrastate Transfer Capability - allows juveniles on probation to be transferred to another probation jurisdiction electronically.
Rollout of Adult Intrastate Transfer Module Related Enhancements - refinements and enhancements to the electronic data transfer process as recommended by the CSTS Supervision Violation Committee.
New Probation Violation Document Upload to MNCIS Feature - a joint project with the Minnesota Courts System, this feature allows agencies to submit Probation Violation documentation to the Courts directly from CSTS.
·Released a New "Smart Chronos" Feature - allows agencies to setup reportable data elements with an alternative case noting feature.
·CSTS/SharePoint Integration - completed a project integrating the CSTS document management system with Microsoft SharePoint.
·Court Information Summary Reporter (CISR) Updates - implemented recommended system enhancements and upgrades for Microsoft IE 11 and Edge.
·Received a Court Technology Grant - the Corrections User Group received a grant to implement the technology to receive MNCIS notifications. This will allow CSTS agencies to subscribe to automatic updates of selected MNCIS court data.
·JAIMS Enhancements - completed a project of all high priority system enhancements.
·JAIMS Accounts/Receivable Module - completed a project adding accounts receivable functionality into JAIMS to complement its billing system.
·JAIMS/CSTS Integration Study - working on a project to determine the functionality and impact of an integration of JAIMS into CSTS.
Law Enforcement:
Meeting was held on March 29thwith both CIS and BCA in attendance. BCA presented an update on the NIBRS project and CIS presented an update on the CIS products. Scott Kent moved to chair. Bryan Storms is now past chair; Kay Schultz moved to Vice Chair; and Shane Sheets was elected as the Recording Officer.
ISSG:
Not received yet.
County Attorneys:
·Tech committee – we formed this group to handle technology issues that come up. This committee is a response to the forum we held last year to address concerns and improvements requested by users. The current vice-chair of the committee is the chair of the tech committee, and is a tech savvy person.
·Speed issue – the program sometimes bogs down and users have to shut down the program completely in order to bring it back up to normal speed. The tech committee has been trying to tackle this issue. They have contacted an outside source to see if that entity can make headway on this issue.
·Liaison between MCAP’s, BCA and state courts. We have improved our relationships without outside agencies that have a direct impact on or by MCAP’s. If there are issues, they are dealt with directly and efficiently resolved to the satisfaction of all parties.
·Marketing. We have decided to implement some form of marketing to try to reach a wider audience. Also, if someone calls MnCCC, there are currently no written materials to provide them that describe how MCAP’s works. We want to have written materials to present to prospective users. Also, we are looking to reach out to other conferences (other than just the MCAA) to provide information regarding our software.
·Grants. We are looking into forming a subcommittee whose express function is to seek out and pursue grant opportunities.
·Networking. We are looking to improve communication between users, such that, they feel encouraged to join committees or be involved in testing. Several users have expressed an interest in allowing prospective users to come to their location and see MCAP’s in action. This may also be a part of our marketing strategy.
Xerox Tax:
·The Xerox Tax Advisory Committee worked hard during the past year to tie up loose ends and assist in keeping the momentum of the new Tax system going.
·After several reviews by the committee members, we have finished what we believe to be a comprehensive and adequate revision of the rules and regulations. This version will be brought before the full user group meeting at the June conference for approval. As part of this revision, two new sub-committees were created; the Training Committee and the Beta Testing Committee. If the Rules and Regulations are approved, TAC will be looking for volunteers to participate in these committees.
·Members of TAC also participated in meetings to discuss challenges that leaders of the new tax system were facing. We were able to work through those challenges and the committee members continue to provide feedback on the development of the different modules of the new system.
·The Xerox Tax Advisory Committee continues to look for volunteers to participate in the committee. It is a great way to learn even more about the Xerox Tax system and meet great people.
Thomson Reuters Tax:
·The Thomson Reuters Tax Advisory Committee (TAC) meets the first Thursday of the month. Attendance is in person or via conference call and all Aumentum system users are encouraged to attend, either in person or by phone.
·At the June MCCC conference the user group will be voting in a new Vice Chair as well as a new Recording Officer due to the past Recording Officer accepting a position with Dakota County. Dana Anderson, the chair of the training committee, has some great training sessions lined up for the conference this year as well.
·The test committee has been actively working through issues in version 10, which is slated to be rolled out to the counties this summer. Minnesota specific special assessment and fiscal disparity programming was recently released and is being tested. The committee meets via conference call every Monday morning to discuss progress and problems with each other and Thomson Reuter staff.
·The contract committee is currently in negotiations for the new maintenance and support contract and hopes to have a final draft in place before the June conference for presentation to the entire user group. The current contract expires at the end of 2015.
·In September 2014, the advisory board members attended the Thomson Reuter’s user conference in New Orleans. We met with VP of product development Brian Cunningham and discussed ways to more efficiently handle programming changes before they become issues. That led to increased involvement by Thomson Reuter staff to better understand complicated legislative programming changes. There were still bumps in the road but they weren’t as significant as the previous year.
CAMA:
·Testing the ECRV enhancement.
·Rita Treml retired this past year so Michelle Moen is acting Chair until the June conference. Jennifer Flicek is now the new Vice-Chair and Anne Grunert was elected to the vacant committee member position. Anne was asked to serve as the Recording Officer beginning with the May 2016 meeting...
·The committee was seeking someone to replace Rita on the Commercial/Industrial committee and Anne Grunert volunteered.
·The PRISM project is still underway with Jackson and Winona counties beta testing.
·PTM design team continues to work with Xerox on the new product LRMS 10X. It was noted that at the June conference, Xerox will have demos on the product so far. Farley had hoped that there would be terminals available for “hands-on” look to the product. There have been WebEx demos performed by Xerox.
·We will have a session on Monday at the June conference. Xerox will provide a demo and then we will have a discussion on Assessor’s Best Practices covering a couple topics.
·The CAMA committee continues to have conversations regarding the Spatialist product and incorporating that product with the new LRMS 10X project. The thought is to use Spatialist in place of programing for Market Approach.
·The Joint Powers agreement should be coming out and counties will need to get those approved by the County Boards.
·MCAST continues to improve and is used as a tool for Assessors.
PIUG:
·The meeting schedule was revised to allow for more meetings, but less travel. With the frequency of meetings improved, enhancement requests are not idle nearly as long.
·Approved multiple enhancements to the Beacon website
oAppraiser contact information
oAlternate parcel owner mailing list
·Working with Schneider for a GIS 101 course
·Contract Amendments
oMnCCC – Schneider
oMnCCC – Pictometry
·Working to expand membership in the group as each member of the user group will receive a 10% discount from Schneider once we reach 30 members.
F&GG:
·Finance and General Government for the past year has started contact negotiations with Xerox for Paymate, Treasures Financial, Cash Register and Capital Assets. Representatives from Xerox met with the contact committee and are open to multiple year contacts, with hosting as options to each product.
·We have also started revising the Rules and Regulations for our user group.
·Optimum Solutions:
oClay and Isanti County converted to Windows Suite
oWatonwan County joined group
oWindows version available
oOptimum Time & Attendance & RT Vision import into Windows Suite
oComp time custom for MN counties
oPERA, MCIT, work comp, IFSpi, JE interface for MN Counties
JIC:
·Contract negotiations were finalized with Trimin. Went from having multiple contracts with individual counties to one contract between JIC member counties and TriMin. A new fee schedule was also developed and adopted.
·The Training Committee put together 2 year end training sessions for counties. It was the first time that has been done in a few years. Plan is to go forward and keep holding them, as many counties think they are beneficial.
·The Training Committee has also been working on providing other misc. training opportunities to the counties throughout the year. Some will be held as webinars and some will be face to face. As a part of these trainings, the committee is looking for "Super Users" - individuals that have knowledge to share regarding the training topic.
·Golden Wiki - the hosting platform has been moved to TriMin. The next steps with Golden Wiki is to decide who and how it should be updated. Many counties still find it beneficial as a training tool for new staff and want to continue to use it.
·Many items on the Enhancement list were discussed and prioritized. The Best Practices/Enhancement Committee is looking at many items to see if they should go forward or not.
Tax Court User Group:
1. Determine pricing with SCOMAR
2. Determine pricing with MCCC membership for counties
3. Tax Court User Group meeting at MCCC conference June 7th.
4. Demo of SCOMAR product.
5. Consider input from Counties.
6. Where do we go from here?
7. Gather experts for sharing of resources (Attorneys/Appraisers)
8. Work with larger counties to ensure that Tax Court case data is loaded to the new system.
9. Customize product if need be.
10. Roll out new product.
MnCCC/Xerox PTM (LRMS 10s) Project
The past year has been very eventful for the PTM Project. A year ago the user group was contemplating if there was a future for the project. Today significant progress is being seen.
I won’t dwell on what has happened during the past year. I try to keep everyone who is interested in the project informed. Instead this report is going to focus on where we are at and the future.
The development phase of the original Project Plan was built around what Xerox called 3 Iterations. Each Iteration included a certain portion of the entire project functionality. The programming of Iteration 1 has been completed and it has been released to Hennepin County for testing. I have been in contact with Hennepin and they are basically pleased with the testing results. Xerox is presently developing Iteration 2. The programming originally planned for Iteration 2 has changed. This is due to Xerox writing a new Project Plan. The new Plan has more Iterations and this allowed some of the functionality originally scheduled for Iteration 2 to be moved to later Iterations. The new plan includes the same amount of work as the old but the new plan has more Iterations to allow the work to be broken in to smaller segments. It also allows Xerox to focus on the functionality required by both Hennepin and MnCCC first and then in the final Iteration to finish up the functionality required by MnCCC but not required by Hennepin.