Kane County committee amends Axon contract to add cloud features, sends change to finance

KANE COUNTY, Ill. — The Kane County Judicial and Public Safety Committee on May 15 approved an amendment to its existing multiyear contract with Axon to add cloud storage, multilingual transcription and AI tools for prosecutors and law enforcement, then sent the revised agreement to the county—s finance committee for budget review.

The amendment will add features Axon rolled out after the county—s original 2022 contract, Anthony Ortiz, director of operations in the state—s attorney—s office, told the committee. "It also comes with a transcription new transcription feature because a lot of, our community speaks multiple languages," Ortiz said, explaining the county now must run separate transcriptions for English and Spanish but the new feature would transcribe multiple languages in one pass.

The change also adds an AI-powered case synopsis feature and other discovery-management tools Ortiz said will speed prosecutors— review of body camera video and phone extractions. "It gives you [a] synopsis at the top of the case," Ortiz said. "So when a new attorney comes in for that case, it—s an easier transition process." He told the committee the amendment will increase contracted costs but that Axon agreed to delay charging the higher rate until January 2026 so the county can address the increase in the FY26 budget.

Why it matters: Prosecutors and public defenders across Kane County already are receiving large volumes of video, audio and phone data tied to cases. Committee members and staff described the Axon features as efficiency tools that can reduce manual labor for redaction and discovery sharing, potentially shortening turnaround time for cases and reducing overtime hours.

What the committee did: The committee approved an amended contract figure that aligns with the remaining term of the county—s existing agreement (the amended appropriation listed at the meeting was $2,665,521). Committee members moved and seconded a formal amendment to reflect the corrected amount and term; after discussion over the cost and where the additional annual expense will be accounted for, the committee voted to send the amended contract to finance and budget for formal appropriation and review. The chair announced the resolution "passes as amended to finance and budget."

Budget and funding questions: During discussion, county staff and board members said the additional annual cost was about $36,000 and that how the extra expense will be handled depends on county IT—s plan to stop storing extractions on a local "K drive." Stacy Turner and other staff said IT is examining whether eliminating the duplicate local storage will offset part of the Axon increase, and that the charge for the new features is likely to be managed from fund 01/27 (the county—s judicial/strategic technology fund) rather than the general fund. The public defender—s office told the committee it remains in talks with Axon about its own storage limits and would seek parity in features if added to the amended contract.

Discussion highlights and concerns: Public Defender Mary Conant (appearing as "Miss Conant" in the meeting) said her office did not join the amendment at that meeting because it is still negotiating storage limits and usage with Axon. "We do not part of our original contract have unlimited storage," Conant said, noting a dispute with Axon over current storage accounting. Board members suggested pursuing a single, countywide purchasing approach to seek economies of scale across the state's attorney, public defender and law-enforcement users.

Next steps: The committee approved the amendment and moved the contract package to the finance committee for formal appropriation and budget alignment; county IT and the state's attorney—s office will continue working to reconcile local storage costs and how much of the new charges can be absorbed or offset by retiring redundant local storage.