Alaska NICS Act Record Improvement Program

The NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007, P. L. 110-180 ("NIAA"), was initially signed into law by the President on January 8, 2008 (reauthorized by Title VI of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2018, P.L. 115-141). The NIAA 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 NIAA authorizes grants to be made in a manner consistent with the National Criminal History Improvement Program (NCHIP).

Under the 2019 NARIP, the Alaska Department of Public Safety will use funds to support four technicians to continue the misdemeanor domestic violence project and supplies for two virtual plus servers. Additionally, the Alaska Department of Public Safety will transfer funds to the Alaska Court System (ACS) to support a Programmer Analyst (PA), two Range 14A Technicians, training, digital recording devices, interface cards, and advanced capture and reporting licenses and maintenance. The PA will work on critical tasks to support electronic forms and criminal data collection in the courtroom application, maintain existing forms, and design, develop, program, test, monitor and implement new electronic forms for collection of complete, accurate criminal history data at trial and appellate court levels, including auditing and validating criminal and other relevant disposition data transmitted in the forms. The Technicians will retrieve and digitize mental health commitments on file prior to 2011.

(CA/NCF)