Residents of the 186-year-old City of Bryan, Texas experience “The Good Life, Texas Style.” This trademarked motto motivates members of Bryan City Government to cultivate an active relationship with its 70,000 fellow citizens. To this end, Bryan kicked-off the new millennium with a groundbreaking document management solution that would eventually lead to the development of the first integration module to connect Laserfiche with its management software, SunGard^® HTE.

Bryan is extremely dedicated to preserving its history, rooted in the westward railroad expansion of the mid-nineteenth century -including city records dating back to 1889. A hundred years later, reflecting a century’s changes in local government, Bryan established a citywide records management system to retain, store and destroy records in compliance with state and federal law. But as the city grew, so did the piles of paper and storage space needed to maintain the system. When two records storage facilities reached maximum capacity, the city sought records management alternatives. In this issue, City Secretary Mary Lynne Stratta, Records Management Coordinator Jodi Chaney and Network Specialist Chris Martin share their experiences with a groundbreaking document management solution.

On the initiative of City Secretary Mary Lynne Stratta, Bryan began exploring digital solutions in 1999, forming a committee to consider various options. The goals were to reduce the costs of document storage and retrieval, transfer and store data from the city’s computer systems, provide online access to city documents and apply retention schedules to electronic records.

In July of 2000, the city issued an RFP. After reviewing four document management systems, the committee decided on Laserfiche because of its ease of use and rapid search and retrieval capabilities. The city soon found out for itself why Laserfiche had such a great reputation among other municipalities as a feature-rich, easy-to-use solution. In just a couple of years after implementation, Bryan would garner media praise with an innovative and award-winning approach to software integration.

Bryan had a detailed paper-records management system before it began using Laserfiche. However, the city wanted to boost efficiency and free up space by eliminating reliance on paper.

To follow city charter mandates, the city secretary needs to be the records management officer with a records management system that meets statewide criteria. Stratta took this responsibility very seriously. Preserving the history of the city , even in unforeseen circumstances, was one of her top concerns. “If a disaster struck,” says Stratta, “we needed to recreate our vital records to get our business going again. I thought that an imaging system was the way to go.”

Offering a way to access records online was equally important to Stratta. She saw the Web as a way to further democratize city government. “I wanted residents to be able to access ordinances, minutes and records that were clearly public that show the history of the city and the actions of their elected officials.”

The search committee looked at four different imaging systems and met with each company as well as officials from other Texas cities.”Laserfiche was the unanimous choice of the team,” says Stratta.

From the end user perspective, Laserfiche was the overwhelming choice. Says Stratta, “It was by far the most user friendly. And the search and retrieval function was head and shoulders above the rest. I also wanted to make sure that whatever system we chose was from a company that was reputable and was going to be around for a long time. Again, Laserfiche beat out the competition-by far. We were making a long-term commitment, and we knew that Laserfiche would be around for a long time.”

City Secretary Stratta has come a long way from her early days on the job. For her entire first year, over 17 years ago, she actually had to bring in her own computer because the city didn’t have one. At that time, Bryan stored paper records in enormous boxes in the basement of the former city hall building, and the only disaster recovery plan was to store birth and death records on microfilm.

Having led the path from sorting through volumes of paper stored in the basement of another building to instant access of electronic records from a desktop, Stratta has a unique perspective on the evolution of records management. Under her stewardship, the city became the first anywhere to deploy an integration module that connected Laserfiche to HTE-the software Bryan uses in all city departments to handle accounting, risk management, HR, permits and other city functions.

Bryan installed Laserfiche in seven city departments beginning with a pilot program in 2001. From the start, Bryan made city ordinances, city council meeting minutes, resolutions and agendas available to the public. Gradually upgrading and expanding the system, so by the end of 2005, Bryan had the latest version of Laserfiche installed in fifteen city departments.

Stratta adds, “That was a huge accomplishment. Previously, in order to access records, people used to have to go downstairs, get a key, go across the parking lot, walk down into the basement, dig for the record, and come back. And when they were finished with the records, they had to go through the same process to put them back. Now we can go into Laserfiche, call up a record, and email it directly. It really saved us a lot of time as well as space.”

The results also dramatically reduced paper and freed up a lot of office space. “We were able to do away with a complete storage center-about 1500 square feet,” says Records Management Coordinator Jodi Chaney.

Management Coordinator Chaney also notes that Laserfiche greatly simplifies disaster preparedness. “When Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita were headed our way, we were able to copy all our ordinances, minutes, and other critical documents onto CDs and put them in a safe deposit box.”

Perhaps, the greatest impact of Laserfiche has been the streamlining of the city worker’s day-to-day workload and the increased access to records by Bryan’s citizens. Customizing the system to work with HTE, the city’s accounting and management software, has been essential to Bryan’s success.

In 2006, building on its already cutting-edge solution, Bryan pioneered an HTE integration module that eliminated scripting and automated the process of pulling information from HTE to Laserfiche. The first of its kind, the installation allows users to open either program to access the other. “It really freed up our IT department,” says Stratta. “And the users love it.”

The city installed the integration module over a weekend with no interruption of service to the users. “We then moved onto training and installation on the client side,” says Martin. “Now that we have a process in place, we bring departments aboard quickly and smoothly. We continually achieve great returns on our investment in both applications, HTE and Laserfiche.”

In other government offices, the integration has likewise increased efficiency and streamlined workflow. “Integration has made the work a lot easier for departments like finance and HR,” says Martin. “It blended well with what they already do. Rather than waiting to scan checks or invoices into Laserfiche, they can do it right when they’re entering them into HTE. They don’t have to wait for scripts to run. The uptime and availability of the system is much greater.”

Overall the Laserfiche solution saves work, time and builds more transparency into city government. Chaney remembers the days before Laserfiche:

“We recently had an open-records request that involved a lot of information. Before Laserfiche, it would have taken at least a month to actually research the minutes and find out all the names of the contracts, easements and documents associated with this project. With Laserfiche, we were able to get a print-out of all the documents the first day. Even taking time to pull the documents that had not been scanned into Laserfiche, we were able to gather all the documents within six business days.”

Martin adds, “Another example is our Finance department. This was the first year that they had Laserfiche, and it made a real difference when the auditors were here. Instead of having the auditors go to physical file cabinets, they saved a lot of time with index searches, going directly through HTE. They actually finished a few days early.”

Network Specialist Martin’s job involves training new users to use Laserfiche. “The training is straightforward and simple,” he says. “People have an easy time understanding the product and how to use it-it’s very intuitive. It looks like the Microsoft^® Windows File System they already know. I usually train ten people at a time, and each session lasts about an hour. ”

Perhaps the greatest measure of success has been the satisfaction of Bryan residents. “The positive feedback we’ve had from citizens has just been incredible. For example, the other day I talked to a real estate agent who had been digging at the courthouse for days to find a document from 1922. I called it up using Laserfiche and emailed it to him in minutes. He was very impressed.”

Stratta is committed to providing great service to Bryan’s citizens and city departments. She thinks back to the days of rooting through boxes to find records. “We’ve come along way to get here.”

Tags: HTE, integration, records management, RME, State and Local Government

Posted on Monday, February 12th, 2007 at 3:13 pm under Government Newsletter, Municipal Government, State and Local Government. You can comment on this article. trackback from your own site.