Award Information
Description of original award (Fiscal Year 2015, $1,708,556)
The NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007, Pub. L. 110-180 ("NICS Improvement Act"), was signed into law by the President on January 8, 2008. The NICS Improvement Act amends the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993 ("the Brady Act") (Pub. L. 103-159), under which the Attorney General established the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). The Brady Act requires Federal Firearms Licensees (FFLs) to contact the NICS before transferring a firearm to an unlicensed person for information on whether the proposed transferee is prohibited from receiving or possessing a firearm under state or federal law. The NICS Improvement Act authorizes grants to be made in a manner consistent with the National Criminal History Improvement Program (NCHIP).
Under the 2015 NARIP priority areas, the Arizona Criminal Justice Commission (ACJC), in collaboration with the Arizona Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) and Dept of Public Safety (DPS), will conduct several projects to improve completeness, accuracy and accessibility of criminal history records in the Arizona Computerized Criminal History (ACCH) repository and III.
1) Continue Multi-Agency Planning & Oversight NICS Task Force: A consultant will be retained to continue progress in achieving project goals guided by the AZ NICS Task Force and Records Improvement Plan. Support from a System Analyst is required to continue gathering critical information to establish requirements, functional specifications, and technical design recommendations for Global Reference Architecture, NIEM compliant segmented criminal record data exchanges. The System Analyst hired under the previous funding will be retained to continue the work with coordinating and guiding system developments to standardize and automate the transmission of case identifiers.
2) Continue NICS Improvement Plan Collaboration with NICS TASK Force Stakeholders: The Task Force sub-committees will continue in developing a strategic plan by addressing challenges and gaps identified through analysis, including: records research and analysis, legal, privacy, and policy.
3) Continue Technical Assistance (TA) Visits to 14 Counties: The ACJC, with DPS and AOC, will provide follow-up TA visits to 14 counties to continue to address missing records for the ACCH. Sessions will be a continuation from discussions started from the TA visits completed under the NARIP 2011 funding. The TA visits delivered baseline statistics through county score cards to establish countywide focus for records improvements. The sessions will assist counties in developing process improvements for the business and system challenges in record reporting.
4) Automate 5,000 records; Purchase ICM-Scan Licenses: Automating the records provides the information required by NICS to identify felony convictions, drug arrests and convictions of misdemeanor crimes of domestic violence, which identify persons prohibited from possessing firearms. Funding will be used to automate 5,000 criminal history records in addition to purchasing 9 ICM-SCAN licenses to enable Repository employees to scan from their work stations to provide a quicker response when a NICS inquiry is received.
5) Develop an Automated System for Orders of Protection (OP) Process: The ACJC with the AOC, DPS and LEAs will develop a comprehensive integrated system to automate the OP process once they have been issued by the court and authorized by the petitioner.
6) Develop Solutions to Causes of Missing Criminal History Records: The ACJC, DPS and DOC will migrate the GAP Reporting process (retroactive process for creating criminal history records) from using the current spreadsheet into an online system that would be maintained at DPS. The ACJC, DOC and DPS will enhance the program through an on-line system that would enable real-time updates and automated notifications to interested courts and LEAs.
CA/NCF