Findings and Observations
The City is currently using two different EDMS software solutions, Ademero (City Clerk) and LaserFiche (Police). The Police are reducing their reliance on LaserFiche due to paperless workflow implementations with the current CAD/RMS system.
EDMS, also referred to as Electronic Content Management Systems (ECMS), can be utilized for much more than document scanning and storage.
Additional uses include:
Enterprise Records Management, including Retention Management
Integrated Document/Process Workflow Management, including Internal Request
Management, and Routing and Distribution (A/P, A/R, HR, Project Tracking, etc.)
Forms Management
Project/Process Collaboration
Minutes Management
Agenda Management
Synchronized Meeting Video Streaming
Over time, an organization’s documentation simply increases. Significant costs are incurred in document processing, printing, storing, retrieving, and other management. More recently, increased FOIA requests have saddled municipalities with sharply increased costs of
compliance; tens of thousands – and sometimes hundreds of thousands – of dollars in labor costs are being incurred. An electronic document management system is one strategy and use of technology to help lessen the burden of finding, managing, securing, and maintaining
compliance.
System benefits include:
Compliance – improved and more efficient ability to comply with increasing volume and
complexity of regulations
Security – improve physical abilities and accessibility security
Workflow Capabilities – provide electronic capture, routing, and approvals of manual paper
processes
Improve Efficiency – increase productivity through automation of manual processes and time
reduction in retrieving and sharing information
Reduce Costs – reduce costs of printing, paper, storage space, and labor Reduce Carbon Footprint – minimize paper waste (a green initiative)
Improve Transparency – increase accessibility to information via the Web, including fully
automating some types of documents immediately upon creation without additional processing or labor
Disaster Recovery – protection of vital records through storage redundancy
EDMS Metadata Integration Catpure Indexing Storage Retrieval Distribution Security Workflow Collaboration Versioning Searching Publishing Reproduction
IT Initiatives (IT Master Plan) – Appendix City of Redlands
CLIENTFIRST TECHNOLOGY CONSULTING Page 43 of 112
Best Practices
Software Selection Best Practices
Return-on-Investment Considerations
Return on Investment (ROI) Consideration
A study conducted by Cooper’s and Lybrand found the following: The average document gets copied 19 times in its life
90% of documents that are handled in an office are merely passed along or shuffled through.
The costs to manage a single document are below:
$20 to file a document
$120 to find a misplaced document $220 to replace a lost document
7.5% of all documents get lost
An office that generates 200 documents a week will lose 15 of them, costing a total
$3,300. 3% get misfiled
An office generating 200 documents a week will misfile 6 of them, costing the
company $720
A feasibility study by the North Dakota Information Technology Department regarding EDMS technology found the following:
A organization that scans 600 documents per day can have the following benefits upon implementing an EDMS:
An ROI payback period of 15 Months Gained productivity of almost $114,375 Subsequent annual savings of $110,295
An overall three year benefit impact of $531,990
Would save 36,556 in annual costs when compared to manually storing and
managing documents
A study conduct by Prescient Digital Media found the an EDMS saves employees between 50-60% of time searching for documents
Staff Feedback
CMO - Need improved City wide records management system (eliminate manual searching of records)
CMO - Need submittal of commission applications through the City’s website.
Attorney - Need to scan documents with OCR capability to eliminate manual typing of entire documents
Attorney - Copy machine is being utilized as a scanner, but does not have OCR capabilities. This would be a great enhancement and time saver for staff if it had this functionality. If not, having the ability to scan a hard copy document so that a software application can recognize text and convert to a document that can be edited would be helpful.
IT Initiatives (IT Master Plan) – Appendix City of Redlands
CLIENTFIRST TECHNOLOGY CONSULTING Page 44 of 112
Attorney - Need to receive requests for public records through the City’s website, which would feed into an automated tracking system or software. Requests could be sent to the appropriate departments for response. Departments could respond through this same software application with documents attached. Ideally, sending the documents to the requestor through the same system would be great. Currently, the City’s email system is being utilized; however, file size limitations create extra work due to having to size files accordingly in order to email.
Clerk - Need new server to publish city documents on Internet for public access
Clerk - Need to complete digitization of all required documents
Clerk - City has been very fortunate to utilize volunteers digitizing thousands of documents
Clerk - So far, all Council resolutions, ordinances, minutes back to 1974, and nearly half the city contracts have been digitized
Clerk - Need to train City staff how to research and access electronic documents
Clerk - Need OCR search engine capabilities
Clerk - Need a Minutes Management software module to streamline process
Clerk - Need to streamline annual Statement of Economic Interests tracking process
Clerk - City purchased Ademero software for $12,000
Clerk - Public access to records has got to be improved. Residents should be given the capability to explore files and research at their own pace and with their own direction.
DSD - Need to auto publish certain documents to City website
DSD - Need a central photo archive for storing, sharing and retrieving photos
DSD - Need to convert microfilmed documents to digital records
DSD - Having to go to multiple buildings to research property files, often even for single urgent inquiries
Fin - Need scanning and document management integration with Bi-Tech
HR - Need to automate Personnel Files. Minimum time savings would be 1.0 hours per day. We have 525 employees, plus retirees, interns, volunteers, separated employees, etc. Current archived data is on microfilm and can equate to numerous hours for research on one single file.
HR - Need document management system like LaserFiche.
MUED - 10-15 public records requests per month. Going to LaserFiche would make searching for document faster.
MUED - Currently spending 9 hours per day searching for documents. Having a company scan historical records and staff scan ongoing documents would make searching for
documents quick and easy and allow record tracking and inquiry capable citywide. Possibly save 7.0 hours per day in document searching.
PD - Police is using LaserFiche less since going to Spillman's Paperless Reporting
PD - Believe LaserFiche Web license searching has a bug issue related to data mapping
QoL - Automating Fee Waiver Process ensures timely action on the part of staff in obtain city council approval
Recommendations
Further investigation of current LaserFiche utilization.
Further investigation the Ademero solutions overall capabilities
Conduct a needs assessment to determine City’s short and long-term needs to determine if one solution is more suited to the City’s overall needs
Review applicable manual processes and shadow systems, such as spreadsheets, to determine automation improvements that will result in labor efficiencies
Depending on long-term costs, it may be cost-beneficial to eventually replace both systems with a single citywide solution
IT Initiatives (IT Master Plan) – Appendix City of Redlands
CLIENTFIRST TECHNOLOGY CONSULTING Page 45 of 112
Consider independent third-party industry expertise, as this is a complex, major enterprise system