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NEW I.T. SYSTEM SAVES COUNTY COURTS $60 MILLION + . . . . AND COUNTING
By introducing an advanced internationally-praised computerized system of traffic
cases, in the last 3 years, the Miami-Dade County office of Clerk of Courts has
saved close to $60 million in personnel costs and, just as important time for persons
whose traffic cases are scheduled for court hearings. The Clerk office’s Traffic
Division is now handling 32 percent more citations than it did in 2001 with 15 percent
less staff and it has reduced personnel overtime payments by 60 percent.
The improvements in our traffic system, the nation’s fourth largest, were made by
Harvey Ruvin, Clerk of Court who installed technology know as SPIRIT, short for
Simultaneously Paperless Imagining Retrieval Information Technology. SPIRIT has
replaced the outdated manual paper operations with a paperless, highly efficient
electronic archival flow and retrieval, regarded as s model all over the world and
as part of the 2004 Computerized Honors Collection. As the author of the new system
Ruvin was awarded this year’s by Computerworld Honor Program, a national organization
of the IT industry, its Computerized Model of Achievement. The award will be presented
to Ruvin at a special April 4 ceremony in San Francisco.
“The nation’s fourth largest traffic courts uses this (SPIRIT) expert technology
to efficiently schedule cases in 23 courtrooms and manages the vast flow of documents
required to support these court proceedings, said Daniel Morrow, Executive Director
of the Computerworld Honor Program which each year recognizes individuals around
the globe whose use of advanced globe whose use of advanced information technology
produces positive social, economic and educational changes.
According to Ruvin among the savings wrought by SPIRIT is a substantial reduction
in the county’s police officer court overtime (which also takes place in Coral Gables);
reduction of errors to less than 1 percent making the courts more efficient by allowing
judges to immediately see information about cases before them without having to
search for paper files in various locations; and streamlining courtroom processing.
Defendants in traffic cases receive their SPIRIT-prepared - easy to read– court
orders and instructions. Praising Ruvin for his initiative Judge Sam Slom, Administrative
County Court Judge said: “The SPIRIT system is an innovative leap into the future
which has resulted in dramatic improvements in courtroom efficiency and public satisfaction.”
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