TECHNOLOGY INITIATIVES

CUTTING COSTS, LIMITING WORKFORCE GROWTH, AND IMPROVING SERVICES THROUGH INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATIONS TECHNOLOGY

TECHNOLOGY IN HOUSTON
Under the direction of Mayor White, the Technology Steering Committee (TSC) and the City's Chief Information Officer (CIO), the City of Houston continues to use technology to reduce cost, limit growth to the workforce, improve services to citizens and employees, and reduce the risk of business disruptions and security breeches.

The following summarizes some of the major investments:

COLLABORATIVE IT MANAGEMENT CITYWIDE
With a highly decentralized IT environment, i.e. between $95 and $105 million in annual spending depending on how one counts data entry, automated meter reading, radio communications, etc., in eight different organizations, the CIO has implemented the concept of Chief Technology Officers (CTO) in each business unit with significant IT spending. The CTOs are in most cases assistant director level executives who report to the department director as well as the CIO, who chairs the TSC which includes the CTOs as its members.

This management structure provides the citywide benefits of some centralization, or in this case collaboration at the IT executive level, while retaining the effectiveness of IT support within each business unit. Departments which currently have CTOs include the Houston Airport System (HAS), the Houston Public Library (HPL), the Houston Emergency Center (HEC), the Houston Police Department, Municipal Courts Administration, and Health and Human Services.

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY DEPARTMENT AND STRATEGIC TECHNOLOGY INITIATIVES
The Information Technology Department (ITD) was created by Executive Order in July 2003, with the adoption of the FY2004 Budget. Thirty-seven positions were transferred to the ITD in order to improve efficiency and effective security of the network.

Executive Order #1-44, revised in 2006, affirms the existing structure, and environment and process for the current IT, adjusting them to further streamline the management of key components, e.g. servers, and specific objectives to be accomplished over the next several years, and contains the following objectives:

1. Successfully implement, stabilize and leverage the Municipal Courts Integrated Case Management System (ICMS) to provide better service to citizens, attorneys and police officers. Increase efficiencies to reduce the size of the Municipal Court work force. Improve public safety by reducing dismissals resulting from witnesses not appearing.
2. Implementing the SAP solution for financial purchasing, HR and payroll transactions on schedule and within budget and planning for phases 3 and 4 to properly leverage the initial investment.
3. Completing the Network Upgrades for Phase 2 and 3 and adhering to an annual replacement/refresh program to avoid future upgrades of the size of the current effort.
4. Aggressively implement improvements in HPD's IT environment including a new Records Management System (RMS), decommissioning the mainframe/data center at 1400 Lubbock and moving to a client server environment, deploying next generation technology in vehicles to provide electronic transmission of documents, i.e. reports, citations, etc.
5. Begin the replacement of the Pubic Safety Radio Systems for Police and Fire with a financial plan and procurement process to be implemented during FY07.
6. Complete the selection process for a private party to finance and manage a wireless broadband network citywide to reduce/avoid connectivity cost for city government mobile computing, reduce cost for citizens and businesses to access to the internet, bridge the digital divide for low income communities and promote economic development, particularly convention and tourism activity.
7. Centralize Server Management, similar to what was done in 2003 for network management, as part of the Active Directory/Exchange upgrade projects to improve utilization to capacity of hardware, provide improved support and reduce cost. This will involve facilitating the migration from a mainframe to a client server environment over the next three to five years.
8. Assess the existing infrastructure, data base and application integration of Geographic Information System (GIS) assets with the goal of establishing standards for technology, improving data sharing, both internally and externally and reducing cost. Initially this initiative will be focused on all City departments using GIS, but will also focus on collaboration with regional partners to eliminate duplication and increase data availability.

CONSOLIDATED EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS
Prior to September 2003, Houston had three emergency communications centers for 9-1-1: Neutral Public Safety Answering Point, Police Department Emergency Communications Division, and Fire Department Emergency Communications Operations. Each agency had separate answering centers, computer networks, and technical support. The development of the state-of-the-art Houston Emergency Center (HEC) consolidates all of these efforts.

HEC is a $50 million investment towards a secured facility equipped with state of the art emergency communications technology. These advancements are utilized by the center's 9-1-1 call takers and emergency dispatchers from the Houston Police and Fire Departments. System upgrades include police dispatch, fire dispatch, fire records, fire alerting, and geographic information at a cost of approximately $12 million. Antiquated facilities have been replaced with an innovative and redundant complex that consolidates emergency communications.

The upgrades have improved delivery of Public Safety services to citizens who live, work, and visit Houston by providing a facility in which calls for emergency services within Houston can be received and dispatched to emergency first responders. Other capabilities that allow HEC to have reliable communication is its link to two-way radio communication systems that support the City of Houston Police, Fire/EMS, and Emergency Management agencies so that dispatchers can communicate with personnel in the field.

Beyond its daily operations, the facility's Emergency Operations Center, during times of incident activation, allows interface and constant communications with local, state, and federal agencies. The center's most significant benefit is the common protocol for interagency transaction exchange between 9-1-1, Police, Fire, EMS, and Emergency Management.

Approximately 10,000 emergency calls per day are processed at HEC. The volume of emergency calls can easily double during times of inclement weather or special City social/sporting events (e.g. Hurricanes Katrina and Rita (September/October 2005), National Basketball Association All Star Game (February 2006), Major League Baseball 2005 World Series (October 2005), Super Bowl XXXVIII (January 2004), Major League Baseball All-Star Game (July 2004)).

The Houston Emergency Center is one of the most impressive and technology advanced emergency communications facility in the country.

INTEGRATED CASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
In April 2003, City Council approved contracts totaling approximately $20 million to design, configure, implement, and support a new near-paperless case management system that would replace  the Houston Municipal Court's 1980s legacy technology with a state of the art system.

The planning phase of the project was complete in September 2003 , the design phase was complete in December 2003 , configuration for the Parking modules was completed in May 2004, and Parking Division went live with the new system October 1, 2004.  The Traffic/Non-Traffic configuration was completed during August 2005, scanning of 13,000,000 case file documents was materially complete during December 2005, and Traffic/Non-Traffic went live on April 1, 2006. 

ENTERPRISE RESOURCE PLANNING
(ERP SYSTEM UPGRADE / REPLACEMENT)
The City technologies supporting the financial, payroll, materials management and human resource functions were originally acquired in the late 1980s. These systems are out of date with current technologies and are neither efficient from a labor stand point nor robust in terms of reporting. Due to their age, the risk of a system failure is growing and many business processes are extremely inefficient.

To address these issues, the City underwent an extremely detailed and rigorous evaluation, selection and procurement process to acquire new software and engage consultants to assist with the system implementation and process change effort. On April 27, 2005, City Council approved a contract and appropriation of necessary funds to implement SAP ERP software.

Functional experts from City Departments have been moved onto the implementation project team, which is being managed by the Information Technology Department. A Governance Committee co-chaired by Annise Parker, City Controller and Anthony Hall, Chief Administrative Officer of the City, has been formed and is comprised of Department Directors. A major objective of the ERP implementation is the standardization of process across all City departments. The Governance Committee will provide the necessary leadership to ensure this objective is met.

The project encompass two phases: The new Financial and Materials Management system that went live July 5, 2006, the beginning of the City's next fiscal year; and the new Human Resources and Payroll system will go-live March 24, 2007.

ONLINE PROCUREMENT / AUCTIONS
SALVAGE AUCTION
Currently, the City is selling surplus property through on-line auctions via the Internet. Internet sales may include one or more of the following categories: Jewelry, Collectibles, Office Furniture, Computer Equipment, Audio-Visual Equipment, Tools, Sports Equipment, Bicycles, Lawn Maintenance Equipment, Clothing, Luggage and others.

REVERSE AUCTION PROCUREMENT
A reverse auction is a process used to buy good and services in real-time over the Internet. Numerous suppliers and/or manufacturers are allowed to bid, during an allotted time period, on the City's requirements for goods and services in an effort to drive prices lower than the City may have obtained using the traditional competitive sealed bid/proposal process. The City uses a third party (Texas Procurement Center, LLC or TPC) to host its reverse auction procurements.  When a prospective bidder clicks on a reverse auction procurement on http://purchasing.houstontx.gov website, it automatically defaults or takes them to the TPC website where they must register to bid on the project/procurement.

HOUSTON POLICE DEPT. E-GOVERNMENT INITIATIVES
HPD is launching two initiatives in the first half of 2007 to better serve the citizens of Houston through the Internet. One is the implementation of WebCOP . the ability for citizens to submit a police report over the Internet for minor incidents. Initially citizens are going to be able to report crimes of theft (that are under $5,000 and there are no suspects or witnesses), and criminal mischief that is non-vehicle related (such as vandalism or property damage) where there are no suspects or witnesses. Citizens must have a valid, functioning e-mail address and they must be the actual victim of the theft, loss or criminal mischief. The second initiative is the Traffic Accident Report (TAR) program that will allow citizens to purchase traffic accident reports over the Internet. Currently citizens must travel downtown to police headquarters at 1200 Travis and stand in line over the counter in order to get a copy of accident reports filled out by officers on their accident. The TAR capability will allow citizens to conveniently go to the Internet, search the incident number the officer gave them and pay for their accident reports with a credit card.

HPD STRATEGIC PLANNING
The Houston Police Department initiated a Strategic Information Technology planning process during Calendar Year 2004. The planning process identified 27 initiatives resulting in 10 selected for implementation over the next three to five years. The plan also recommended three areas that needed to be examined/developed for successful completion of future IT projects and the continued success of our Technology Services organization. One initiative was the realignment of Technology Services, the second was establishing a departmental IT Governance process and the third was developing a world-class customer service oriented IT organization. Our major initiative over the next three to four years is replacing our current Records Management System (RMS) with a state-of-the-art, commercially available off-the-shelf (COTS) environment that will allow us to leverage modern technology and provide the officers with all the capabilities of having a mobile office in their squad cars. We are in the procurement process and should have a vendor selected sometime during the summer of 2007. In conjunction with the new RMS project we are also hoping to implement a Mobile Data Strategy by leveraging the City's WiFi capability which should be installed over the next two years. This broadband wireless capability will allow us to provide significantly more data to our officers than we can currently deliver to them.

It is likely that these next portions of the strategic information plan will require investments of $10 to $20 million to implement during the FY08-10 budget period.

3-1-1 HOUSTON SERVICE HELPLINE
The 3-1-1 Houston Service Helpline was implemented in 2001 to offload non-emergency calls to the local 911 emergency line, and to improve customer service to the residents and neighbors of our great city. The 3-1-1 call center provides Houstonians quick, simple, and reliable access to all city services, 18 hours per day, 7 days a week. The 3-1-1 call center uses the Motorola Customer Service Request system (CSR), which is an advanced tracking system for service request intake that provides immediate routing of requests for services to the responsible department.

While the three-digit phone number is the most popular method used to contact the 3-1-1 Helpline, Houstonians have the following options for contacting the call center. Dial 3-1-1 from within the corporate limits of the city, or 713.837.0311 from outside the city limits. Fax to 713.837.0210, or E-mail requests to 311@cityofhouston.net. For those that prefer to create their own service request, we offer the 3-1-1 Web Intake System accessible from the city home page at www.houstontx.gov.

From traffic fines and sewer concerns to pothole problems and neighborhood complaints, Houstonians can contact 3-1-1 and receive assistance with any service provided by the City of Houston. The 3-1-1 Houston Service Helpline puts city government at the fingertips of our customers - one call, fax, e-mail, or online service request, and customers get answers, find the right person, or initiate resolution to their service problem via creation of a 3-1-1 CSR service request.

CITIZENSNET
CitizensNet is an email communications system through which the Mayor can periodically communicate directly with Houstonians on topics of particular interest to them and their neighborhoods. By clicking on the CitizensNet logo at www.houstontx.gov Houstonians can register to receive these periodic email communications.

E-GOVERNMENT
At the City of Houston we continually strive to improve the delivery of City services and programs as well as identify new ways to serve you better. Through the tools and information offered online, you have the option to interact with the City 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The eGovernment Center was launched on March 16, 2001 as www.cityofhouston.gov, with a wealth of information for citizens, business, and visitors. On January 31, 2005, we switched to www.houstontx.gov. Our site contains more than 19,000 pages and documents.

Since the initial launch of the eGovernment Center, we have added:

• the ability for citizens to pay for water and wastewater bills, traffic, non-traffic, and parking tickets, reserve tee times at Memorial Park Golf Course;
• 3-1-1 web intake service requests and tracking;
• heavy trash and recycling pickup maps, along with a Heavy Trash pickup pilot program based on physical addresses, rather than ZIP Codes;
• Restaurant food inspection reports;
• "My ZIP Code", which provides information on various City facilities and services and elected officials by ZIP Code;
• a one-stop center for City forms, applications, newsletters and publications;
• a calendar of events, and;
• a comprehensive Spanish Portal
• Downtown parking meter payment project, via www.houstonparking.org
• Phase II upgrade of site redesign launched January 2, 2007

In October of 2005, the Honorable Mayor Bill White of the City of Houston announced an initiative to make wireless broadband services available throughout the City of Houston. This effort is known as the Digital Houston Initiative, described below.

DIGITAL HOUSTON INITIATIVE
The City's vision is to apply ubiquitous, low-cost wireless Internet access as a foundation for the City of Houston to become the most efficient, effective and responsive city government in the nation - while stimulating economic development and promoting digital inclusion for low-income and disadvantaged residents.

Ubiquitous, low-cost wireless Internet access will:

• Reduce the City's communications expenses - saving taxpayers money - and allowing the City to deliver more efficient, effective and responsive services;
• Stimulate economic development, job growth and increased competitiveness for the City - both nationally and internationally - attracting new human, financial, physical and technological capital to the region; and
• Promote digital inclusion throughout the City, particularly in low-income communities.

On Feb. 13, 2007, EarthLink was chosen as the company to negotiate for the right to create the CityWide Wi-Fi nework. View the Mayor's Feb. 13 Press Release. Full information on the City's Digital Houston Initiative can be found at www.houstontx.gov/it/digitalhouston.html.