bell county fy2011 single-year discretionary grant supplement...

1 | P a g e B e l l C o u n t y F i n a l F i d o R e p o r t

Bell County FY2011 Single-Year Discretionary GrantSupplement to the Final Progress Report

Background and IntroductionBell County was awarded a Single-Year Discretionary Grant from the Texas Indigent Defense Commissionin FY2011 to create a web-based tool that would help counties demonstrate compliance with the FairDefense Act and to better track implementation of the local indigent defense plan. The County contractedwith a third party to create Fair Indigent Defense Online, known as FIDo. This system acts as a central hubor data collection point for dates, times, documents, and other information required by the Fair DefenseAct or local indigent defense plan. This document contains responses to one question that is generallyasked of all grant recipients in the final progress report, but has not yet been included in the Bell Countyfinal progress report to date. The responses also integrate the answers to questions asked by TIDC in aletter to Bell County on August 14, 2012 and additional questions asked by TIDC in an email on November9, 2012, which have not been asked or answered elsewhere in the progress report.

Final Progress Report Question:

Please indicate any significant factors, lessons learned, or major accomplishments to be included in ourannual report of discretionary grants.

Major AccomplishmentsThe FIDo Discretionary Grant program has made several major accomplishments, and these are highlightedin this section.

1. Development and implementation of a web-based system to monitor indigent defendants andattorneys from request for counsel to payment of vouchers that follows the requirements of the FairDefense Act and can be implemented in any county in Texas.

Through the utilization of TIDC Discretionary Grant funds, Bell County was able to develop and implementan indigent defense system that allows users to manage attorney appointment wheels, screen arresteesfor indigence, determine eligibility for court-appointed counsel, make attorney appointments, trackattorney jail visits, and submit, approve, and pay attorney vouchers. In addition, all County IndigentDefense Plans have been updated to reflect the new processes developed (both FIDo processes andgeneral business processes) as part of this program.

Currently, all judges who hear criminal cases in Bell County in both the County and District Courts utilizeFIDo. All financial screenings and appointments are made using the FIDo system, and all contemporaryvouchers are submitted, approved, and paid using the system. There were appointments and vouchers inthe pipeline before FIDo development that may still be pending or are now being paid, but allappointments that were made using the FIDo system require an electronic voucher.

Coryell County currently uses FIDo for some Felony and Misdemeanor determinations of eligibility andattorney appointments. The Indigent Defense Coordinator (contact info later in the report) uses the


system to conduct screenings and make appointments for all felony arrestees. The County Judge and staffutilize the system to conduct screenings and make appointments for misdemeanors that have companionfelony cases. The County hopes to transition to 100% utilization for screening and appointments soon,and their progress toward this goal improves each day. Coryell County, with the assistance of consultants,has trained the court appointed attorneys and provided them access to their Attorney Portal. The Countyhas not implemented attorney fee vouchers at this time, but intends to do so when appropriate.

Many elements of the FIDo system, for example a county’s definition of indigence, are configurable andthe system is web-based, which allows the Fair Indigent Defense Online (FIDo) system to be portable toany county in the state. Implementation of the system has already been initiated in Coryell County, aswell as the 38th Judicial District, which includes Uvalde, Medina, and Real Counties.

The system is entirely web-based and exists in the cloud, which means it does not require server spacewithin a county, nor is implementation limited because of the language in which it is written. It iscurrently maintained by Managing to Excellence at the direction of Bell County, but it requires nosupport from the Bell County IT department. The program could be configured to operate as an internalcounty system, but Bell County and the others who have implemented thus far have expressedpreference for a web-based system. The current server environment is using CentOS 5.6 operatingsystem with 2048 MB RAM and a 80 GB Hard Disk. The system is written using PHP and utilizes a MySQLdatabase. The server resides in Dallas, Texas, in a state of the art secure data center.

Regarding program and functional specifications, all that is required for a county to implement thesystem is a reliable connection to the internet, a web browser like Internet Explorer, and the capability toview PDF reports. A short period of time is required by developers outside of the county to configureand customize settings (such as indigence qualifiers) to the county’s needs and in compliance with theindigence defense plan. This is a truly portable system that overcomes some of the issues that hamperedexpanded implementation of software systems in the past.

In order for the system to perform its designed capabilities (how the program executes its functions),data must either be manually input into the system or consumed from another source. For example,arrest date and time can either be electronically entered into the FIDo system through an interface withthe jail system, or it may be entered manually entered in the fields marked “Arrest Date” and “ArrestTime.” Specific to Bell County, the program has the capability to accept electronic data from court andjail systems, but the County made the decision not to implement this capability at this time for tworeasons. First, during the initial development of the program, the jail announced it would changesoftware systems. This implementation is underway and the possibility of a link between this newsystem and FIDo will be explored further in the future. Second, the County has been notified that theversion of the court software current utilized in the Bell County will not be supported in the comingyears. The County is evaluating its options on this front and may choose to address interconnectivitybetween a new court system and FIDo in the future.

In order to demonstrate compliance with the Fair Defense Act, the following information should beentered into the FIDo system by either electronic or manual means:


1. Arrestee name2. Arrest date3. Arrest time4. Magistration date5. Magistration time6. Request for Counsel date7. Request for Counsel time8. Financial screening information/questionnaires9. Attorneys qualified to handle cases on each wheel10. CLE/Board Certification for attorneys who are currently on the wheel

Using these inputs, the FIDo system can: Calculate the time between arrest and magistration and report compliance with the FDA Calculate the time between request for counsel and appointment of counsel, taking into

consideration whether the request occurred before, during, or after magistration and reportcompliance with the FDA

Make recommendations on whether to appoint counsel for an arrestee Automatically appoint the next qualified attorney on a wheel for a particular offense Appoint a new case to an attorney who already acts as the attorney of record to an indigent

defendant Generate notice of appointment to attorneys Track all appointments on all wheels for compliance with the FDA Permit vouchers to be created for cases once the appointment has been made Permit vouchers to be submitted to the judge hearing the case Permit judges to review, amend, and approve vouchers submitted by attorneys Interface with an electronic payment system to pay approved vouchers Allow attorneys to place themselves on hold from appointments for any/all wheels Allow the County to place attorneys on judicial hold from appointment for any/all wheels Monitor CLE submission on the part of attorneys qualified to take court-appointed cases

Additional functionality and reports can be customized to any county’s needs, but the list aboverepresents the ability to demonstrate compliance with the FDA that is built into FIDo. In addition,changes in statute to the Fair Defense Act can be developed in one place and pushed to all counties thatimplement FIDo because it is currently a web-based system that exists in the cloud. As with any system,however, the number, quality, and accuracy or the outputs are dependent upon the quality and accuracyof information input into the system.

As requested by TIDC, the utilization records have been provided in Table 1 on the following page. Each arearepresents a specific data requirement or function of the software, and the number provided is the recordcount that is detailed by each table. In other words, the table shows the number of total times that an areahas been utilized in the FIDo system to date. Items of special interest are highlighted in yellow.


Specific to this grant and the accomplishments in Bell County, development and implementation of thisprogram allowed Bell County to accomplish the objectives laid out in the Statement of Grant Award, asfollows in Table 2.

In addition, Bell County has been able to reduce the jail population by combining the indigent defense andbond offices into a pretrial services department. The coordination of the two departments allows staff toroutinely monitor the jail for those defendants who have not requested counsel and/or remain in jail whenthey may qualify for a PR bond. For example, Bell County data indicate that the number of cases added tothe docket in the first quarters of 2010 and 2012 increased by about 600, but the jail population increasedby less than 100 arrested for the same period. This represents a substantial savings to the County.

Finally, standardized reports can easily be generated from the system to demonstrate the County’scompliance with the FDA and the indigent defense plan. Screen shots of the system are attached at theend of this report.

Table 1: Utilization RecordsArea Records Area Recordsattorney 110 hard_stop 5attorney_appointment 8,681 i_file 77attorney_appointment_offenses 7,571 jurisdiction 21attorney_audit 498 language 11attorney_override_reason 4 mental_health_status 5attorney_status 6 offense 4,449attorney_wheel 9 offense_attorney 8,830attorney_wheel_offense 10 offense_level 11county_attorney 42 override_reason 3county_employee 96 override_reason_ineligible 8county_finance_category 22 reset_reason 2decision_reset 20 source_code 475defendant 7,775 states 53defendant_category 1 title_role 12defendant_offense 13,493 training 36defendant_offense_audit 9,409 training_audit 36exclusion_reason 6 transition_queue 8,054fq_assets 4,863 voucher 1,816fq_auto 1,762 voucher_activity 7fq_dependant 4,614 voucher_category 5fq_employment 6,201 voucher_offense_details 5,015fq_expense 15,012 voucher_offenses 2,352fq_header 9,874 voucher_status 8fq_income 3,705 voucher_type 20fq_person 1,415 voucher_type_offense_level 92gl_translate 475


Table 2: Statement of Grant Award Objectives and AccomplishmentsGrant

ObjectivePrior to FIDo Since FIDo

Reduce timebetweenarrest,magistration,decision onindigence andappointment

Prior to FIDo, times between arrest,magistration, and appointment decision werenot consistently tracked. There was not anon-manual method of calculating ormanaging the compliance within theseevents. Also, arrest information was notusually captured as an important componentfor the compliance metrics for the process.

Automateattorney wheeland log anychanges inappointment

Prior to FIDo, the attorney wheel wasmanually tracked on one legal sheet of paperfor all county attorney wheels. The designeemanually checked off each attorney in orderof when the appointment was assigned. Thedesignee would skip attorneys on the sheetof paper if the attorney was on hold or had astatus change.

Attorneys who are qualified to accept court-appointed counsel have their contact informationentered into the FIDo system, along with their CLEexpiration date and the levels of cases they arequalified to handle. Attorney appointments onindigent defense cases are generated by thesystem on a rotational basis. All appointmentsare trackable through the system, as areattorneys’ statuses on the wheel. Attorneys mayput themselves on hold or they may be put onjudicial hold. Attorneys on either type of hold willnot receive appointments.

Automateattorney CLEreporting andrecord keeping

Attorneys provided the indigent defensedepartment with a paper copy of CLE course

credits prior to CLE expiration date(attorney’s birth month). Indigent defensewould audit the list and requirements onceper year.

Attorneys log into the FIDo attorney portal andenter CLE course info directly into the system.Additional improvements in tracking CLE will bedeveloped as part of the Attorney Training,Mentoring, and Evaluation grant.

Increaseaccuracy ofattorney feevoucher byonlinecompletion oftime andexpenses

Attorneys provided paper vouchers upondisposition of the case. The majority of thevouchers were handwritten and oftendifficult to read. Categories for paymentswere not tied to State reportingrequirements which resulted in quarterlyreview of all vouchers by the Auditor’s Office.Vouchers were occasionally misplaced or lostor not transferred to the correct departmentfor processing. The payment timeline couldvary greatly and there were frequent lengthydelays in the payment of the voucher.

During the course of representation or upondisposition of a case, attorneys enter time and/orfee data into the FIDo system based on the levelof offense and type of disposition (plea/dismissalor trial). There were also several related benefitsof the online voucher. First, the electronicvouchers provide attorneys with an online billingsystem – something that attorneys have eitherpurchased on their own or simply gone without.Second, attorneys submit vouchers much moretimely through the FIDo attorney portal, withmany vouchers submitted at the time of casedisposition using laptops that have been installedinto each courtroom or attorney’s personalcomputers. Judges will often approve flat feevouchers from the bench immediately or shortlyafter it is submitted. Analyses of FIDo datarevealed that the median time to approval ofvouchers was less than two days. The voucherline items are tied directly to GL codes that matchthe required Indigent Defense ExpenditureReport, which will continue to expedite statereporting in the future.

FIDo records indicate that for those with botharrest and magistration dates and times enteredin the system over the last two quarters, themedian time from arrest to magistration was 9hours, and over 98% of maigstrations were timely. Thesetimes meet the statutoryrequirement that thosewho are arrested appearbefore a magistrate within 48 hours of arrest.


2. Secured judicial, attorney, and other stakeholder support for county-wide changes

In order to provide appropriate oversight and direction for the FIDo program, Bell County organized anoversight board that brought together the judges who would be impacted by the FIDo program. This wasnot only important for organizational purposes, but the oversight board also allowed the County todemonstrate commitment to the new processes. Stakeholders such as defense attorneys, pretrial servicesstaff, and others were able to stay informed of the process and provide support for the system because ofthe judicial leadership. The judges have held these monthly meetings throughout the life of the FIDodiscretionary grant and will continue to meet in the future. The meetings have become a great tool tofoster communication about goals and objectives for indigent defense in Bell County.

3. Thorough analysis and rebuild of indigent processes in Bell County

When Bell County set out to develop the FIDo system, it quickly became apparent that simply creating aweb-based tool to automate existing practices would only be a partial solution. Instead, the Countyproceeded to thoroughly analyze indigent defense business practices to determine if efficiencies could begained in decision-making processes, to reduce duplicate data entry in separate offices or departments, toidentify paper processes that could be made electronic, and to identify manual processes that could beautomated. This led to a rebuild of the indigent defense process and related revisions to the County’sindigent defense plan. For example, following an assessment of how requests for counsel are processed,Pretrial Services staff were placed in the jail to quickly screen those who request counsel for indigencewhether that request occurred before, during, or after magistration. This allows many arrested to bequalified for court-appointed counsel at the time of their request and allows those who do not initiallyrequest counsel to be monitored and screened at a later date if needed.

Another significant change that has been implemented as part of the business analyses associated withFIDo development is the increased ability to track the requirements set forth in the indigent defense plan.Although the County previously required court-appointed attorneys to visit their clients in jail, there wasnot an easily accessible way to manage all appointments, in-custody clients, and attorney visits. Theattorney portal in the FIDo system allows attorneys to enter in the dates of client visits, and a business

Increaseaccuracy ofloggedattorneyactivities percase andmonitoringcapability

Attorneys were previously required tointerview their clients within a “reasonabletime.”

Attorneys enter line item detail in electronicvouchers that improves accuracy and monitoringcapabilities. Attorneys may enter data forrequired jail visits, communication with client,court appearances, discovery, trial preparation,and pleas/dismissals. The attorney is able toenter the first jail visit directly into the system viatheir voucher which is sufficient for reporting toPretrial Services.

The Bell County Indigent Defense Plan nowincludes a required visit within 10 business daysof appointment for in-custody clients. This firstvisit must be reported and is tracked by Pre-TrialServices. Failure to timely visit results inreminders and may include judicial removal fromthe list attorneys eligible for appointment.


process was developed and included in the indigent defense plan to provide an escalated warning systemto those attorneys who do not visit their clients. To date, although several attorneys have received lettersfrom the County due to failure to visit an in-custody client, no attorney has been removed from the wheelfor failure to visit appointed clients in jail – likely due to the early warning that is provided to them.

4. Implementation of FIDo in Coryell County

In addition to the implementation of FIDo in Bell County, the original Statement of Grant Award alsoproposed implementation in two surrounding counties—Lampasas and Coryell – and the system has beenimplemented in Coryell County. Training has been conducted for judges and their staff, and training willcontinue with an indigent defense coordinator who has been hired to start on October 1, 2012. His nameis Michael Hull and, although he does not have a permanent office set up yet, mobile # is 254-223-2843.His email is [email protected]. Until Mr. Hull is fully on-boarded, court staff will make indigentdefense appointments using the FIDo system.

Coryell County has also made business process changes as one part of FIDo implementation and hasadopted many of the changes made by Bell County. For example, the County has decided to remove astandard of “partial indigence” from the indigent defense plan in favor of a 125% of the federal povertylevel standard. Coryell County will make these and other changes to the indigent defense plan to reflectthe new processes.

Lampasas County decided to delay decision-making regarding FIDo implementation because the DistrictJudge will retire at the end of his term in December 2012. The 27th Judicial District shares jurisdiction inBell County and has used the system in Bell County courts, so it appears likely that Lampasas County willbe open to ongoing FIDo conversations in the future.

5. Dramatically improved transparency in the indigent defense system

Prior to implementation of the FIDo system, there was no centralized data collection that would easilydemonstrate Bell County’s compliance with the Fair Defense Act and indigent defense plan. Whileinformation regarding magistration times, indigence qualifications, dates of appointment, attorney CLE,and voucher submissions and payments was available under the previous process, the data was stored ina variety of departments including the jail, clerks’ files, and the auditor’s office. This made compliancedifficult to demonstrate, but the FIDo system has greatly increased the transparency—and, therefore, theaccountability—of the indigent defense system in the County. The FIDo reporting tools, as describedabove in point one, make this information immediately accessible from one centralized location.

6. Allows the County to better meet the needs of indigent defendants

The improved data collection and monitoring associated with implementation of FIDo has also allowedBell County to initiate additional programs that meet the needs of indigent defendants in the County.First, Bell County received a Discretionary Grant from the Commission to establish a mental healthdefense program. Like many other jurisdictions, Bell County has a significant portion of the jail populationwith mental health issues—many of whom have had more than one arrest for relatively minor offensessuch as criminal trespass. The FIDo system allows indigent defense staff to indicate in a defendant’sinformation whether a mental health specialist attorney is required and to make an appointment of aqualified attorney. This program helps to separate a defendant’s criminal justice issues, which can be


addressed by the mental health defense program, from their mental health issues, which can beaddressed by community service providers or other mental health services outside of the defenseprogram. The defense program also allows the County to better manage instances when those defendantsmay pick up additional charges and resolve them in an appropriate manner. The data collected andmanaged by FIDo has been very useful for this program, and additional FIDo development will continue toimprove the coordinated representation of this population.

FIDo development also lead directly to the implementation of the attorney Training, Mentoring, andEvaluation (TME) program. The increased wheel management capabilities of FIDo allowed the County totake a more proactive approach to the qualification of attorneys who may handle the higher offenselevels. To do this, the County developed the TME program to provide ongoing training to attorneys ontopics of particular relevance or interest, such as voir dire, pretrial motions, rules of evidence, and criminalprocedure. Attorneys may also participate in the mentoring program that pairs more experiencedattorneys with those who are new attorneys or have recently qualified to handle court-appointed cases.Finally, attorneys on the wheels will be evaluated utilizing a standardized set of measures to help thejudiciary make informed decisions about the performance of the attorneys on the wheel and whetherattorneys should be qualified for more complex cases, remain where they are, be placed on judicial hold,or be removed from the wheel. As with the mental health program, additional FIDo development willfurther the goals of the TME program and help to ensure that indigent defendants are represented byattorneys with the experience and knowledge required to handle those cases.

Significant FactorsSeveral significant factors contributed to the accomplishments listed above. These included:

1. Support of judiciary, commissioners, county staff, and defense bar.

As noted above, broad-based support helped to push this project through to completion. Loss of supportfrom any group of stakeholders could have derailed the development and implementation of FIDo, but thebroad-based support for the program has ensured that the County is committed to the process.

2. Employees and FIDo users are willing to implement changes and are open to new processes.

Change in county operations is never easy, but Bell County has been impressed with the level ofacceptance with which the FIDo system has been embraced. For example, attorneys bring tablets andlaptops into the courtrooms to complete vouchers, and judges – even one District Judge who will retire atthe end of this term – have installed laptops in their courtrooms that specifically allow defense attorneysto access FIDo. Without the day-to-day users’ commitment to FIDo development and associated businessprocess changes, it is very likely that the system would not have been successful in the County.

3. Bell County is small enough to have a manageable indigent defense system but large enough to havethe technological capabilities to implement this type of system.

We believe that one reason Bell County was successful in FIDo development was because it is a medium-sized county that has the number of indigent defendants necessary to make this type of investmentworthwhile, but not so many that they would overwhelm the new system. Requests for counsel, indigencescreenings, attorney appointments, and vouchers all entered the system at a rate that would allow FIDo


users to get comfortable with the system and use it routinely without being bombarded with large wavesof new data each day. This is important because it allows the system to experience small “growing pains”and work through them as they arise.

4. Good working relationship between contractors and County

Bell County contracted with Managing to Excellence Corporation (M2xc) to oversee, develop, andimplement the project for the grant funded web based portable software. The close working relationshiphas been a project cornerstone because the County and contractors have enjoyed mutual trust among oneanother. The ability of a third party or “outside” group to be part of the analysis and implementation isinvaluable as they can often cross departmental and political boundaries. The professional consultants donot have any specific objective and look at the process to make sure it meets the needs of the county. Thethird party is also critical for effective communication as they are more generally accepted by all as nothaving any specific objective other than making the situation better.

Lessons LearnedLike all large scale changes, Bell County has had several “lessons learned” throughout this process. Someof the most important are highlighted below.

1. Lesson One: Business Processes Matter

As described above, although FIDo can automate many indigent defense processes, the decisions thatfeed into the system make a difference. The County decided that it did not want to simply make existingprocesses electronic and run the risk of simply speeding up a flawed process, but would undertake theimportant analysis work described above.

2. Lesson Two: Stakeholder Support is Essential

Indigent defense involves many different departments including local law enforcement agencies, thecounty jail, the courts, commissioners, defense attorneys, clerks, and auditor among others. This oftenmeans that changes that appear to be simple are actually quite complex. Without the broad-basedstakeholder support developed in Bell County through extensive meetings, ongoing communication, andphased implementation, it is unlikely that FIDo would have been as successful as it has been to date.

3. Lesson Three: Training is key

Process changes ask people to take on new responsibilities, change their previous habits, and utilize newprocesses. The same is true for FIDo: the required skillsets change when the system is implemented.People who utilize FIDo need to learn new skills, and the county must evaluate any personnel changes thatmay be needed, reclassification of existing personnel, etc. Training should also be ongoing, as newcontingencies will continue to arise that will require clarification of policies and preferred decision-makingprocesses to be communicated to stakeholders and FIDo users.

4. Lesson Four: Implementation doesn’t always go as planned

Large system changes rarely, if ever, proceed as planned, so counties must be flexible enough to handleprocess and decision-making issues that are revealed when systems come under closer scrutiny. Flexibility


in implementation is often correlated to increases in the timing of build- and roll-out, and that wasdefinitely true in Bell County. The decision, however, was made to take the time necessary to carefullythink through issues that arose, rather than to sacrifice analysis for the sake of time. Consensus buildingwas crucial to the successful implementation of change.

As requested by TIDC, below in Table 3 is a list of the Activities as described in the original grantapplication, the planned solutions, and a description of whether the activity was implemented asfollowed, how, and/or why (not). Indications will be made for areas that have already been addressed orwill be addressed later in the document.

5. Lesson Five: Full automation dependent on county-wide systems (jail, courts, etc.)

Although the FIDo system has allowed the County to either automate or make electronic many of theindigent defense processes and paperwork, full automation from the time of arrest to the payment ofvoucher is dependent upon other system already deployed in the county. For example, arrest dataincluding date, time, booking information, arresting agency, and complaint numbers are all enteredmanually into the FIDo system because the ability for the current jail to “talk to” FIDo has not yet beenbuilt into the system. The County is in the midst of implementing a new jail management system, and thehope is that this system will be able to populate more of this information directly into FIDo. The courts’system has similar data that is entered manually into FIDo until the time at which the various systems canall work together to minimize duplicate data entry and reduce the risk of transpositions errors, blankfields, and the like. In other words, while FIDo does not consume arrest/booking/custody data from thejails or generate magistration forms the automatically capture magistration date/time, the system hasfields for each of these pieces of data that could be further build out in the future. Until that time, thesystem depends on manual entry and serves as a centralized data collection point for FDA-related items.

The data for payment of approved vouchers is currently interfaced into the county’s accounts payablesystem. The duplication of information in the accounts payable system has been removed and hassignificantly reduced the amount of time and effort required to pay attorney vouchers.

In conclusion, the development and implementation of the FIDo system in Bell County has createdincreased transparency and accountability in the indigent defense system. The County can more easilydocument compliance with the Fair Defense Act using the system on a variety of fronts. Requests forcounsel and financial screening can be conducted, tracked, and monitored; appointments for counsel canbe made; and payments for court-appointed counsel can be entered into the system and submitted to theauditor’s office. The County can also manage the attorneys on the wheel with CLE and attorney holdsentered through the attorney portal, as well as judicial holds, pending attorney applications, and inactiveattorneys through the main FIDo system. The goal is to continue to build on these wins by integrating newfunctionality into FIDo through other Bell County grants from the Commission and other Bell Countyfunds.


Table 3: Proposed Activities Described in Original Statement of Grant AwardLocal Plan/FDA req. Proposed Solution Implemented Solution

The magistrate shall recordthe date and time that theperson was first arrestedand when the person wastaken into custody. Meet48 hour timeline formagistration

The future system solution shouldcapture arrest date and time from iLeadsor arresting agency data.

FIDo contains fields to capturearrest date/time and magistrationdate/time. This data is currentlyentered manually into the system,as Bell County is implementing anew jail management softwaresystem. Once that system is fullyimplemented, the County will re-examine greater automationbetween the jail, magistration, andFIDo processes.

Meet 24hr timeline forDefendants to beinterviewed and qualifiedfor court appointedattorney.

Pretrial services personnel inserted intothe Jail Process capturing indigenceforms as part of booking/magistration.

Automation of the Forms and Processesas part of the future system solution willreduce time consuming tasks to meetFDA guidelines and eliminate the needfor additional staff to complete manualprocesses.

Pretrial Services personnel arepresent In both the Killeen and BellCounty Jails. Many requests forcounsel and screenings initiatedprior to magistration, and staff areavailable to assist with requests forcounsel both at the jail and at theJustice Complex. Once thescreening is complete, the systemautomatically makes arecommendation on indigence forPretrial Services staff.

Attorney Appointmentdone on a rotating basisfor qualified attorneys onthe appointed list.

The future system solution should allowmaintenance of attorney qualificationsto case types, rotate the attorneyaccording to present business rules, andautomatically create the nextappointment based on those rules.Changes to the automated appointmentwould be logged to an audit file. Theappointment would beemailed/faxed/published on a portalonce the appointment was finalized.

*See discussion above

Indigent Defense willmonitor Attorneys toensure confirmation ofreceipt of appointmentand contact made to clientwithin 1 working day ofappointment.

Automation of the process and formsinto an Attorney portal will allowconfirmation of receipt and contact tobe logged in that portal. Investigation ofenabling email integration will also bedone.

Attorneys are required to provide avalid email address as part of theircourt-appointment applicationmaterials. Notifications ofappointments are sent to thisemail address and copied toPretrial Services to ensure deliveryof email. It was determined thatadditional confirmation of receiptof appointment was not needed atthis time. In addition, attorneys areinformed that statute requirescontact within one working day.The County has thus far focusedthe majority of its attention tovisitation of those clients whoremain in custody, as describedabove.


Indigent Defense willmonitor attorneys toensure that a Jail visit ismade in person within 5working days ofappointment.

Automation of the process to allowattorney self-logging of Jail visits into theattorney portal of the proposed systemwill allow automated tracking ofcompliance. Required Jail visitation logscan be used to validate anydiscrepancies on an exception basis.

The County has amended theindigent defense plan to requirevisitation of in-custody clientswithin 10 working days. Because ofthe jail’s designated times forinmate access by defense counsel,the County determined that 10days rather than 5 days was areasonable time requirement forthe initial interview. See abovediscussion for further detail onhow this is monitored.

Counsel appointed torepresent a client in acriminal proceeding shallbe paid a reasonableattorney fee forperforming the service. Nopayment shall be madeunder this article until theform for itemizing theservices performed issubmitted to the judgepresiding and the judgeapproves.

Automation of time and effort loggedagainst a case by way of an AttorneyBilling solution would improve thelegibility and accuracy of capture, andalso allow cross checking of attorneytime on multiple cases to ensure noduplication of charges.

The County has amended theindigent defense plan to provide aflat fee for pleas and dismissals, aswell as an hourly rate for trials. Seeabove for further discussion onvoucher submission process.

Review of attorney feevouchers by Judges.

The compilation of case activity,visitations, experts etc within theproposed system would allow Judges torapidly assess the accuracy of the claimand speed the approval andreimbursement process.

See above for further discussion onvoucher review process.

If the judge disapprovesthe requested amount ofpayment, the judge shallmake written findingsstating the amount ofpayment that the judgeapproves, and each reasonfor approving the amountdifferent from therequested amount.

Automation of the approval of feevouchers through the new system wouldalso offer the ability for Judges to adjustapproved fees with accompanyingreasons logged against the change.These logged changes would be routedto appropriate persons for informationand to document compliance.

If the judge has questions or notesdiscrepancies in a voucher, it issent back to the attorney toreview. If the voucher amount isdisapproved, the judge states thereason in the appropriate field onthe voucher. The voucher isedited, approved by the judge asedited, and forwarded forpayment.

Attorneys must bequalified to be on therespective lists, prove CLEcredits and follow rules forappointment or removal.

The development of the web solutionshould include an attorney performanceand qualification module that wouldallow the monitoring of a dashboardstyle set of performance indicators(number of cases, average fees per casetype, number of hours committed bycase type, frequency of client contact,etc.) In addition the ability to captureCLE qualifications would be considered.Logging of inmate complaints would alsobe considered.

FIDo currently displays eachattorney’s CLE expiration date andallows attorney to enter in CLEcredits earned during the year.Logging of inmate complaints iscurrently under development as apart of the TME grant.


Ability to meet 24 hourdeadlines for inmates fromKilleen/Harker Heightsjails.

Investing in addition Pretrial headcountto support the Magistration process inKilleen and Harker Heights will allow >200 inmates per year to be released onPersonal Bond prior to transportation,thus removing housing andtransportation costs for all departments.The accessibility of the web-solutionwithin these Jails will allow more rapidcompletion of assessments, improvedservice to indigents and more rapidappointment of counsel.

Pretrial services staff are installedin the Killeen jail and are able toconduct financial screenings andissue PR bonds prior to transportto Bell County jail.

Annual Reporting casenumbers, and break out ofexpenses: attorneys’ fees,investigation, etc.

Within the implementation of anattorney billing solution that is flexibleenough to capture the correct level ofdetail for each attorney voucher andcase type, the data can then be mappedto automate the yearly reporting fromthe proposed system and/or fed to anyGeneral ledger system.

See above for description of linksbetween vouchers and GL.

Monitoring of the overallprocess.

The development of a KPI ormanagement portal would be useful.Example information that could bepresented on this portal could include: Number of new cases with courtappointed atty Average days from magistration to courtappearance Number of cases out of compliance withatty visitation rule Cases per Attorney per case type rolling6 months Number of inmate complaints perattorney Total billings per month per attorneysby case type Average billing per case type perattorney Average cost per case type with list ofmajor outlier (Top 5 most and leastexpensive)Each of these would require someadditional data to be captured orindexed during the process; but wouldallow a more effective assessment ofprocess.

FIDo has a series of report builtinto a Reporting tab that allow forongoing monitoring of the indigentdefense system. See screen shotsattached for examples of thesereports.

County Portal:Arrest to Voucher

View Defendants

Add a New Defendant

Add an Offense

Add a Financial Questionnaire

Signed Financial Questionnaire

Work Queue

Eligibility Determination

Transition Queue

Appoint an Attorney

Order Appointing Attorney

All Attorney Appointments

View Vouchers

Attorney Portal

Attorney Appointments

Submit a Voucher

Attorney Vouchers

Add CLE

Change Availability

Judge’s Portal

Voucher Queue

Voucher Detail

View Appointments

View Attorneys

County Portal:Attorney Management and Admin

Attorney List

Edit an Attorney

FIDo Reports

FIDo Reports: Version 1These are the first attempts at reports for FIDo.Some changes have been made to reports andothers are still under development, as will be

noted in FIDo Reports: Version2

Attorney Appointment Listing

FQ Indigency Denial Listing

Days to Appoint

This report is being completely overhauled in the second version of FIDo grants. The new reports will display timelyand untimely magistrations for each arresting agency in both table and graph form. Similar reports are underdevelopment for the number of working days from request to appointment.

Attorney Wheel by Wheel

CLE Expiration Date Listing

In Custody with No Attorney Visit

Summary Payable by Attorney

This report is being further developed as part of the new FID grant reports. It will provide a comprehensive listing thatcan be filtered rather than require the user to enter an attorney name and batch date.

Attorney Portal Visit Report

Attorney Visitation Compliance

FQ Listing

Offense Report by Court

Magistration Exception

No Arrest Date/Time

MH Attorney Required Active Cases

Defendant without a SID

Offense with No Cause Number

Non-Pending Vouchers

Non-Pending Voucher Billing Detail

Ready for Judicial Approval

No Cause Vouchers

FIDo Reports: Version 2These are reports that are currently under

development. Reports in the Sandbox instancedisplayed here may not contain complete data.The County Respectfully Requests that thesereports remain internal until complete. They

are provided to TIDC for informationalpurposes only.

Active Appointments

A graph is currently being developed to visually depict the number of appointments per attorney

Appointments by Court

Appointments by Wheel

Attorney CLE Training Compliance

Attorney Wheel Attorney Audit

A graph is currently being developed to visually depict the number of attorneys that are active or on any type of holdfor each wheel

Attorney Wheel by Wheel

Jail Time Track

This report is currently acting as a placeholder until the ability to track time in jail is fully realized

Time to Magistration

I File Report

Outstanding Vouchers

A graph is currently being developed to visually depict the number of outstanding vouchers in each status (approvedas modified, returned to attorney, etc.) by judge.

Submitted for Judicial Review

Voucher Report

Voucher Status by Judge Crosstab

County Portal:Attorney Management and Admin

Administration

bell county fy2011 single-year discretionary grant supplement...

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