11/15/2000 By Diana Baldwin, Staff Writer, Copyright 2000, The Oklahoman

Flaws in the Oklahoma Supreme Court's statewide computer system are inflicting financial havoc on many state agencies that depend on courthouse revenues to finance their operations.

Control of court criticized Previously blamed for snarling district court dockets in Oklahoma's eight largest counties, the problem-plagued computer system continues to prevent the state agencies from obtaining millions of dollars they are due and need to fund critical operations.

The status of anticipated funds for advocates of abused children, crime victims and law enforcement officers appears as scrambled as some court information was after the conversion a year ago to the $5 million computer system. Plans call for all 77 counties to be placed on the system eventually.

Frustrated court clerks in Oklahoma, Tulsa and Comanche counties acknowledge they are holding money that is due the state agencies, but say they can't forward the money because they can't figure out how much each agency is owed. Clerks say they were forced to begin using the computer system without financial capabilities.

The result has been a multitude of financial problems. For example:

Advocates for abused children thought that on Jan. 1 they finally would get hundreds of thousands of dollars needed to help young victims of sexual and physical abuse and neglect.

Ann Mundy, executive director of the Child Abuse Response and Evaluation Center, said she will have to begin searching again for donations.

"I thought after seven years, we finally had stable funding," Mundy said. "It will be another year living in the unknown."

The Department of Public Safety owes about $2.1 million for 105 new vehicles, which will begin to be delivered next month.

The agency had counted on money collected through the courts to help buy the vehicles. Officials now are looking at how to find other money to pay for the vehicles.

"We don't know what to expect," said Randy Jorgensen, the department's budget director. "I hate to play 'what if' when there are so many unknowns."

More than $1.1 million paid to crime victims by convicted criminals is held up in county treasurers' accounts.

Suzanne Breedlove, administrator of the Crime Victims' Compensation Board, said she estimates she is short about $550,000 from Oklahoma County and $560,000 from Tulsa County from Jan. 1 through Sept. 30.

The Council on Law Enforcement Education and Training needs its money to operate and pay the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation its portion of the money to run its state-of- the-art fingerprint equipment.

Council attorneys are threatening to charge at least three of the state's court clerks a penalty that could double what they already owe.

Agency officials say they need their money. They successfully fought for legislation to raise fines and court filing fees to eliminate money woes. But for now, they don't know how much money they will have for paying bills or meeting approaching allocation deadlines mandated by state law.

Court clerks in three of the state's largest counties -- Oklahoma, Tulsa and Comanche -- say they've got the money, but they don't know how much goes where. Court officials say the transfers will be made as soon as they can get their books to balance. No one knows when that will be.

Court clerks reverted to writing receipts by hand for all financial transactions once they went on the new system. Tulsa County, the first county to go online, used manual receipts for five months.

Problems with the converted data from the old mainframe computer system and software coding problems added to accounting troubles.

The backlog of paperwork caused clerks and their deputies to work overtime, nights and weekends. Additional employees were hired in some counties.

Oklahoma County Court Clerk Patricia Presley said her office handles an average of 900 financial transactions a day and takes in $20 million a year. She has hired 10 additional employees at a cost of $113,558 to keep up with her work load since she started using the new computer.

The Oklahoma Court Information System, operated by the Oklahoma Supreme Court, is designed to be the first fully integrated statewide court computer system in the United States. The goal is to have a system that can be accessed through the Internet.

The system, touted to have the latest and best technology, is supposed to allow people, cases, arrest warrants and financial information to be tracked throughout the state's court system. Equipment and software is installed in 37 counties.

Oklahoma Supreme Court Chief Justice Hardy Summers concedes that there are problems with the computer system.

"I think our people are sincerely working to get them up where they need to be," he said. "I think we are making progress. It's just slower than we anticipated."

But Tulsa County Court Clerk Sally Howe Smith and Presley said they never thought they would be faced with so many problems.

"The new computer system is far less accurate, less functional, slower, and directly costing the courts millions of dollars," Presley said.

Smith said Kevin King, director of the Supreme Court's Management Information Services, started working on the district courts' portion of the computer system too late to have it online before Jan. 1, when the old mainframe computer was expected to develop problems because it was not Y2K compliant.

"It was underfunded, under- manned and on too short of a time frame," Smith said. "There is extreme diversity in the district courts and lots and lots that goes on behind the scenes. ... Unless you are real active in district courts, you wouldn't know."

Court clerks in the other five counties already on the system -- Canadian, Cleveland, Garfield, Payne and Rogers -- have overcome many of their problems. Some operated a separate accounting system and have been able to balance their books and pay the money they owe.

A fine situation

The Department of Public Safety ordered 105 vehicles costing about $2.1 million. The department also must buy lights, radios, radar and bumper bars for the new cars that will cost about $1 million.

The Legislature increased traffic fines to fund the replacement of Oklahoma Highway Patrol vehicles, some of which have logged 170,000 miles and are still driven daily by troopers. The fine increase went into effect July 1.

Budget Director Jorgensen said about $240,000 of the anticipated $3 million from the fine increases was on hand by Oct. 31, despite projections that the fine increases would bring in $250,000 a month.

Jorgensen said the bulk of the money should come from Oklahoma, Tulsa and Comanche counties. They have made no transfers so far.

State law requires that the vehicles be paid for 45 days after delivery. Jorgensen said delivery of some of the vehicles is expected next month.

Oklahoma drivers owing traffic fines also got a break with the computer system. The court clerk normally notifies the Department of Public Safety of outstanding fines. Now, some court clerks aren't sure who has paid their fines.

In fact, court clerks couldn't ask judges for warrants to arrest people who didn't pay their fines or costs in other cases because computer records weren't current or developed incorrect data from the conversion.

Data problems also have plagued traffic ticket information transferred from the court's system to the Department of Public Safety.

Points earned for traffic violations have not been added to drivers' records. Therefore, some drivers avoided having their licenses suspended.

Gene Thaxton, manager of telecommunications at the Department of Public Safety, has been working with King and the Supreme Court's Management Information Services for at least six months to correct problems.

"We have made some headway," Thaxton said. "There needs to be changes in the programming."

King was unavailable for comment.

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-- Doris (reaper@pacifier.com), November 16, 2000

Answers

-- spider (spider0@usa.net), November 16, 2000.