FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
October 14, 2009

Monmouth County receives PARIS grant award
Cited for its Open Public Records Search (OPRS) system

TRENTON – In ceremonies held recently in New Jersey’s State House, Secretary of State Nina Mitchell Wells announced that Monmouth County has won a PARIS Grants Award for Excellence in Category II, Public Online Records Access, for its Open Public Records Search (OPRS) system.

The county has expended $444,982 to design its OPRS system, which not only increases access to public records by the public and local government staff, it also creates an efficient means of sharing data and records between local governments.

“We are very proud of our OPRS system and we are gratified by the fact that it has been recognized by the state of New Jersey,” County Administrator Robert M. Czech said. “Transparency in government is very important, and this system provides access to public records.”

The system’s major functions include tracking all incoming OPRA requests, management of all internal and external forms, the ability to author, edit, and publish for Web access meeting minutes and agendas, land and tax record lookup, administrative functions such as a centralized database and image repository, security and backup of data, and disaster recovery capability.

Through this project, the county is providing servers and infrastructure improvements at the Monmouth County Information Services Department, the host site, while municipalities are provided computer workstations and scanners and a high-speed Internet connection.

Permanent records will be accessible as the OPRS expands into more county and municipal offices. In addition, Monmouth County is piloting the development of a municipal ordinance management module that will enable municipalities to manage the entire workflow of creation and updates to ordinances, including audit review and public notice, with expansion of the module to all municipalities after the completion of the pilot.

Monmouth County also received a special PARIS Grants Award for Excellence for Artemis Participants, shared by Salem and Warren counties for their work in the development of the automated Records Retention and Disposition Management System (RRDMS, nicknamed Artemis) hosted and maintained by the New Jersey Division of Archives and Records Management (DARM).

This project was a collaborative effort: Monmouth County developed the software and system; Salem County provided procurement activities for the system’s development and testing, and Warren County tested Artemis with its own county records inventory management system to ensure already existing systems would be able to interface directly with the state’s system.

Artemis, which allows an agency to search  retention schedules and submit disposition requests through a Web-based portal, was rolled out to New Jersey’s 566 municipalities and 21 counties during the summer of 2009. The collaboration of the three counties has streamlined the method in which records retention and disposition is handled in New Jersey.

The Public Archives and Records Infrastructure Support (PARIS) grants program is the nation’s leading state program for upgrading the security, integrity and efficiency of local government records administration. It is administered by the Division of Archives and Records Management (DARM) in the Department of State. 

Award recipients were presented their awards from Secretary Wells and Doug Robinson, Executive Director for the National Association of State Chief Information Officers (NASCIO).

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