NEMESIS would not have proven possible without the assistance and support of CRIMNET. Since 2002 NEMESIS has received three very valuable local planning and implementation grants matched with local funds and in-kind efforts that have resulted in a comprehensive shared and integrated criminal justice collaborative in the state of Minnesota’s Arrowhead Region of northeastern Minnesota.
CRIMNET provided a $50,000 grant to St. Louis County matched by $50,000 from the County for regional planning purposes. The St. Louis County Sheriff; Duluth, Hermantown, and Proctor police departments and UMD Campus Police used the matching funds and a significant in-kind effort to commence an ambitious project to be called NEMESIS, the North East Minnesota Enforcement and Safety Information System.
The following steps were accomplished during the first planning phase of CRIMNET:
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Completed total requirements analysis for new law enforcement system
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Identified interfaces and means of integrating systems
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Contracted with Constellation Justice System to obtain complete technical design for law enforcement system and interfaces
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Installed Constellation Justice System’s DAMION Prosecutor in regional prosecutor’s offices
The second CRIMNET grant provided the NEMESIS partners with $800,000 matched by the five NEMESIS partners with $540,000 in cash and $260,000 of in-kind effort. The following items were accomplished as a result of the implementation grant:
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Installation and purchase of necessary hardware and software
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Conversions of data
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Completion of SHIELD Law Enforcement application
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Horizontal and vertical interfaces
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Initial SHIELD training
- ADDITIONAL IMPLEMENTATION GRANT
The third grant from CRIMNET was in the amount of $140,000. It provided the spark for region-wide participation by making training and data conversion possible and improved the integration and sharing environment substantially. As a result, the original five law enforcement agencies and prosecutors have been joined by 14 more law enforcement agencies, six jail and corrections agencies and multiple 911/ CAD agencies. A landmark cooperative effort has come to fruition.
St. Louis County has solely funded a state of the art Jail management system that is tightly Integrated with the SHIELD Law Enforcement application and several related interfaces. This system is completed and in production.
Through federal funding, St. Louis County is replacing its 911 / CAD system and implementing a new system region-wide with interfaces.
In 2004 St. Louis County pursued a Federal appropriation from Congress to provide a state of the art, new, regional 911 Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) system to be use by multiple counties. With the assistance of United States Senators Norman Coleman and Mark Dayton and United States Congressman James Oberstar, St. Louis County was fortunate to receive the $937,000.00 Federal Appropriation to be administered through a grant managed by the Bureau of Justice, Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS).
In 2005 St. Louis County along with representatives of Cook, Carlton, Lake and Koochiching Counties Sheriff’s Offices developed an extensive Request for Information (RFI) reviewed 14 proposals and several vendor demonstrations. Tiburon Inc. was chosen as the potential.
St. Louis County engaged in extensive negotiations with the selected vendor and in the summer of 2006 executed an agreement to provide this state-of-the-art, regional, 911 computer aided dispatch solution. A very important facet of the negotiated contract with Tiburon Inc. is that it allowed for the low cost regional expansion of this CAD system to any counties within the Regional II Sheriff’s Association interested in participating in this regional effort. The following additional counties: Aitkin, Cass, Pine, Itasca, Crow Wing, Mille Lacs, and Kanabec are eligible for participating without separate contracting. Pine County has all ready indicated that they wish to participate in the NEMESIS 911 CAD System.
Kevin Kivisto, St. Louis County Sheriff's Office, and Kevin Huff, Tiburon Inc. are the Project Managers for the respective parties. The project schedule has been established and the business practice review has been completed.
The selection and negotiation process was a collaborative effort. Region Sheriffs wish to thank St. Louis County Land Department (Tom Zeisler), St. Louis County Planning Department (Darren Jablonsky, Bruce Grohn and Brian Tovionen), St. Louis County Attorney's Office (Michael Dean and Tom Stanley) and St. Louis County MIS Department (Marv Bodie and Wendy Hallfrisch) for their substantial assistance in making this project possible.
Thanks to the efforts of the criminal justice community in Northeastern Minnesota and CRIMNET, a robust sharing and integrated environment has been established to serve the public meeting the CRIMNET vision:
“Putting the right information in the hands of the right people, at the right time at the right place”