Mandatory e-Filing in Texas - CITOC · Mandatory e-Filing in Texas . Casey Kennedy ... Put a RFP for statewide electronic filing system to ... Waller Brazos . Grimes . Madison Robertson

OFFICE of COURT ADMINISTRATION

Mandatory e-Filing in Texas

Casey Kennedy – Director, Information Service

Texas Office of Court Administration


About Casey

• Computer Science graduate from UT Austin (hook ‘em)

• “Long Time” IT

• “Short Time” Court


Tx. Tourism Code – 36.225(A)(2)

“When giving presentations to people outside of the State of Texas, one must include at least one slide devoted to describing how Texas works.”


State Demographics

25 million people 254 counties More than ½ of the population lives within 10 counties – Texas cities you can name, plus surrounding counties Legislature meets for 6 months in odd numbered years. Harris Co.

4,000,000+

Loving Co. 67


Quick Civics Lesson (It has relevance)

Texas was originally extreme northern Mexico

Bunches of Americans moved from Tennessee/Missouri/etc to populate the area.

1836 – Texans declared independence from Mexico and formed the Republic of Texas (it’s own country)

Ran as it’s own country until becoming part of USA in 1845

Secession talk/handing letters to the president…


Texas Judiciary

Supreme Court

Court of Criminal Appeals

Courts of Appeals

District Courts

County Courts

Justice Courts

Type of Court # of Elected Officials Who’s IT shop?

9

9

80

458

510

817

1,288 Municipal Courts

OCA

OCA

OCA

County

County

County

City


Texas e-Filing Model

Filers EFSPs EFM Court Systems

Commercial Companies

State Provided County

Provided

$3-$12.50 $5.50 $0-$5


eFiling circa 2010

• Ran by an Executive Branch Vendor

• Cost Recovery (Toll-Road) Model

• Bought at the Fire Sale (Original developer went bankrupt)

• Permissive in 52 counties, including the most populous ones

• About 10% adoption (2,500 filings per weekday, statewide)

• Old and broken (classic asp, didn’t want to expand because of $$$)

• Old version of OASIS to transmit


Then this happened…Summer 2011

Put $15M in the sack and we’ll re-write the system. Oh, and the per transaction cost will be going from $5.50/filing to $9.50/filing.


OCA to the rescue…

Put a RFP for statewide electronic filing system to replace the existing eFiling system.

Keep the existing EFSP model

Wanted a state provided EFSP (no frills)

Wanted turn-key solution

Needed to transition counties from one EFM to another


Continuing down the trail…

• RFP out in Feb 2012

• Back late spring 2012

• Vendor selected summer 2012

• Notified Texas.gov that we’d be leaving

• Contract signed 11/9/12

• Had EFSP model • Had free EFSP • Reduced toll from $9.50/filing to $6.50/transaction

(which can have multiple filings) • Toll was on a sliding scale based on transaction volume






Provided

$0-$12.50 $6.50 $0-$5


Muwahaha

OCA knew that the Supreme Court knew the value of eFiling and its transformative properties.

OCA knew that the Supreme Court knew the value of eFiling and its transformative properties.

Contract provision that said if the Supreme Court mandated eFiling, the toll would auto-reduce to low price.

In December 2012, Supreme Court mandates that all civil cases in county/district courts and all cases in appellate courts must be e-Filed.






Provided

$0-$12.50 $3.50 $0-$5


Supreme Court Mandates

10 12 136 17 23 56


The Legislature lends a hand…

• Passes bill to increase the filing fee • No regard of mode, fee same for

paper vs. electronic • Money from fee appropriated to

OCA to pay for e-Filing • OCA amended the contract to move

from a toll-road to a freeway






Provided

$0-$12.50 $0 $0-$2


Transition Time

• System turned on and configured Spring 2013

• New system brought up in the cloud and in “Production” on 6/6/2013 (Yes, that’s D-Day)

• Standards adopted on the proper formatting of an electronic document.

• First county transitioned from the old EFM to the new in July 2013

• Planned to transition the top 10 most populous by 11/1 (a month ahead of the mandate) and the other 42 by March 2014.


Then this happened…Summer 2012

Ok. Either put a ton of money in the sack and we’ll keep the schedule. If you don’t we’re pulling the plug on e-Filing on November 30th no matter what.


YEE HAW!

• No – no more money – cut the schedule

• Collaborate with an EFSP to snag the current EFM configs.

• Review and mitigate the risk of transitioning all 52 counties quickly

• Relationship between new EFM vendor, EFSPs, OCA and clerks solidified through extreme dislike of the old vendor.


Fall 2013 • Top 10 most populous counties communicated impending date.

• EFSP Fairs

• Local Bar Presentations

• Mailers/Flyers/Radio/TV

• Two high courts jointly adopt amendments to the rules for eFiling support. (I have never seen this before!)

• All 52 counties successfully transitioned by 11/15/2013 • Yes – there were hiccups, but quickly resolved

• Prepped Supreme Court for mandate frenzy • If 1% of the filers called to complain, the court would receive about 250

calls – YIKES!


MANDATE HIT ON 1/1/14


Virtually Crickets….

• Supreme Court received 2 calls, 1 email

• Document volume jumps from 2,500/day to 10,000/day

• Registered users up to about 11,000

• Very quiet, very scary, no issues…


Filers Fight Back…

Insanity = Performing the same actions and receiving different results with every try.

Travis County (Austin) – 23 e-Filing codes

Harris County (Houston) – 525 e-Filing codes


Clerks Unite

• Developed Standards • eFiling Case Categories, Case Types, Filing Types

• Return for correction reasons

• Standard Additional Services


Status Today

Dallam

Hartley

Oldham

Deaf Smith Collings- worth

Har

dem

an

Foard Wilb

arge

r

Wic

hit

a

Gaines

Cla

y

Mo

nta

gue

Co

oke

Gra

yso

n

Fan

nin

Lam

ar

Red

Riv

er

Bowie

Cass

Marion

Harrison

Mo

rris

Titu

s

Fran

klin

Delta

Hu

nt

Wood

Camp

Gregg

Panola

Ru

sk

Ellis Smith

Navarro Hill

Hood

Somer- vell

Shelby

Sabine

Newton

Orange

Jefferson

Chambers

Galveston

Brazoria

Matagorda

Calhoun

Aransas

Nueces

Kleberg

San Patricio

Ken

edy

Willacy

Cameron

Hidalgo

Starr Za

pat

a

Jim

Ho

gg

Bro

oks

Du

val Webb

La S

alle

McM

ulle

n

Bee Dimmit

Frio Zavala

Mav

eric

k

Jim

Wel

ls

Live

Oak

Goliad Vic

tori

a

Wharton Bexar

Val Verde

Real

Terrell

Sutton Kimble

Bandera

Kerr Kendall

Comal

Guadalupe

Hays

Brewster

Presidio

Pecos Jeff Davis

Reeves Cu

lber

son

Hu

dsp

eth

El P

aso

Cro

cket

t Schleicher

Andrews

Ward

Loving

Earth

San Saba

Lampasas

Mills

Hamilton

Bla

nco

Williamson

Travis

Milam

Lee

Bastrop

Caldwell

Lavaca

Colorado

Austin

Washington

Burleson

Fayette

Waller

Brazos Gri

mes

Madison Robertson

Leon

Polk Tyler Jasper

San

Au

gust

ine

San Jacinto

Walker

Montgomery

Lib

erty

Hardin

Harris Fort Bend

Coryell McLennan

Bell

Falls

Freestone

Limestone

• Mandatory in 22 counties + High and appellate courts

• Permissive in 80 counties (88% of pop) • Vendor is about 1.5 deadlines ahead


Lessons Learned

• Keep pushing for free

• The EFM is like highlander (There can only be one)

• Standardize, review, then standardize again

• Communicate, and then communicate some more

• Prepare for, but do not fear the unknown

• Realize and expect complaints from all angles. They will subside.


Questions/Contact

Casey Kennedy [email protected]

http://www.txcourts.gov/jcit

This has the contract + amendments and other e-Filing goodness

mailto:[email protected]

http://www.txcourts.gov/jcit

Documents

Mandatory e-Filing in Texas - CITOC · Mandatory e-Filing in Texas . Casey Kennedy ... Put a RFP for statewide electronic filing system to ... Waller Brazos . Grimes . Madison Robertson