"Instant answers" boost police productivity

The Brentwood Police Department in Tennessee sought a document imaging and content management solution to replace its time-consuming manual process of managing paperwork, consisting primarily of forms generated in response to calls.

In December 2005, for example, the police department (for the city of more than 30,000 people) received 2,068 calls, generated 400 tickets, responded to 181 motor vehicle thefts and 251 non-vehicle thefts, and was involved in 233 court cases. Many of those calls resulted in the generation of incident reports.Systems integrator AccuImage of Nashville designed a new electronic system for the police department that includes a Bell + Howell scanner with EMC Documentum ApplicationXtender. It also developed multiple applications in which various documents can be stored and managed. Furthermore, it converted a considerable paper backlog into digital images. AccuImage reports that most documents are now scanned and available in the system the same day or within 24 hours, and can be retrieved by a variety of criteria, which serve as index fields. Employees can pull up a document in real time, print it on demand and hand it over to the person who requests it.

The city of Brentwood can run activity reports on the documents scanned into the system, based on a variety of search parameters or wild card searches. The result has been a significant improvement in productivity. Jeff Hughes, head of the department's Administrative/Technical Services Division, says, "I don't think you can put a value on how much time we've saved. The new system has made us much more efficient with our records. Rather than getting up and going to the file cabinets, records are easier to pull up—instantly--on the computer. This proves beneficial on a daily basis." The new system has increased staff productivity, primarily by providing, what Hughes calls, "instant answers."