PAX Centurion - Summer 2017

www.bppa.org PAX CENTURION • Summer 2017 • Page 21 B ECAUSE ITWAS PUBLISHED ONMARATHON MONDAY (in addition to the fact that it was actually published in the Boston Globe , of all sources…) most of us probably missed the attached, page one article “Boston police officers say new record management system is a “nightmare” (4/17/17, P.1). And therefore, many of us also probably missed the following statements attributed to former Commissioner Ed Davis: “… But despite pushback from then-Police Commissioner Ed Davis, the Menino administration had chosen Intergraph, anAlabama-based software provider (Ed.: hmmh, none of those danged “software pro-vidas” up here in Mass., now is there?), to create the system. “I didn’t want it [the new and improved computer system],” Davis said. The reason: “Their track record with other departments.” Now, since Ed Davis was the originator of the BPD’s vaunted “truthfulness,” policy, you’d think that he wouldn’t want to come up with such a quadruple-Pinochio, grossly-obscene, double-bagger, mendacious and bold-faced lie as that one, but now that’s he’s a “security consultant” for the major news media (Ch. 4), well, “fake news” is sort of de rigeur , to be expected, par for the course, et al and ad nauseum, etc. etc., isn’t it? For Davis to blame the now-departed administration of a now- deceased Mayor, when he kept his mouth shut and said nothing 3-4 years ago, is a little, er… disingenuous, wouldn’t you say? The truth is, the overwhelming majority of us who were (semi-) trained in the new and improved computer system knew at the time and know today that the BPD’s computer system is complex, time-consuming, frustrating and anything BUT user-friendly. Street-cops are spending way too much time fighting against and navigating their way through a computer system that produces reams of blank pages of often non-existent or useless information. Simple reports that used to print out in one or two pages now take 4, 5 or more pages. Arrest reports are voluminous and can actually be weighed or measured in height after they’re finally produced. On the BPPA demands more complex, time-consuming, frustrating, non-user-friendly computer system (Actually, NOT, but since we usually get the opposite of whatever we complain about, let’s hope for the best….) By James W. Carnell, Pax Editor other hand, computer geeks, policy-wonks, paper-supply companies, (and street thugs, for obvious reasons) love the system. If this new and improved computer system was supposed to make police-report writing quicker and easier, then it achieved the 180-degree polar-opposite. Most of the superior officers doing the training, as well as the trainees, knew the system was cumbersome and unwieldly from the get-go, but their (and our) complaints went unheeded, brushed aside by “those who know better”. The (attached) front page of the Jan.-Feb. 2014 Pax Centurion (“Coming: Computer Chaos Conundrum”) highlighted this issue and predicted exactly what the Globe finally reported almost three years after the system was introduced in the summer of 2014. (It meant nothing when we complained about it, but it became a “Page-One expose´” when the Globe discovered it. Go figure…) From the Globe report: “… Nassau County, N.Y….[the system] cost the city millions in overtime as police officers spent more time at their desks completing reports, information had to be reentered into the system multiple times, and unexplained error messages continued to appear…” “… Dallas P.D. …. problems with the software led to ballooning workloads and hundreds of reports with errors that had to be returned to officers to be fixed…” “San Jose: - the Intergraph dispatch system immediately had operational challenges”. Sadly, the results of not listening to the rank-and-file users of the new and improved computer system were and are thoroughly predictable. What were relatively simple and straightforward reports, such as a simple larceny or a towed car, can now take well more than an hour, depending on the amount of time it takes to correct -and understand- the various error codes. Many a frustrated officer is forced to seek assistance from more computer-savvy officers, whose time is also occupied with their own reports, causing added aggravation and annoyance for all involved. Some officers say See Computers on page 22 The Newsmagazine for the Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association January/February2014 PAXCENTURION Coming: Computer Chaos Conundrum Seestoryonpage9 CourtesyofBoston.com