City Council is slated to vote next week on a five-year, nearly $5 million contract for new software that the San Antonio Police Department will use to file, track, and archive incident reports and other records.
After receiving applications from seven companies vying to provide the software, SAPD officials told City Council on Wednesday that New York-based Mark43 is their top choice.
Mark43 scored the highest in the selection committee’s final evaluation after SAPD officers field-tested the software.
Mark43 and the runner-up company, Niche, were awarded the same number of points in the contract scoring matrix related to experience, background, and qualifications, but Mark43 scored higher for its technical capabilities and its proposal, said SAPD Capt. Karen Falks.
“Mark43 distinguished itself as the top solution for many reasons,” Falks said. The system is all online, can be installed with limited workflow interference, and requires no new staff to implement.
The record management system (RMS) would cut in half the time it takes to file a report, Police Chief William McManus said. The SAPD’s current system is a decade old and is not compliant with a new federal crime reporting policy that will be mandatory in 2021.
Currently, crime data is sent from local police departments to the FBI through a Unified Crime Report (UCR), which tracks eight different serious property and violent crimes. The new National Incidents Based Reporting System (NIBRS) will capture data on 49 different offenses, including white-collar crimes, in 23 categories.
The Mark43 system has been successfully deployed in Seattle, Boston, and Washington, D.C, Falks said. Niche, which has a 2015 contract with Bexar County Sheriff’s Office, is not yet fully operational, she said.
If approved by City Council, the Mark43 system could go live in November next year and could be compliant with NIBRS regulations by 2021, police officials said.
