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Cass County approves purchase of supported jail data exporter to reduce outage risk
Summary
The board authorized an IT procurement of a Tyler Technologies-supported exporter for jail data — Cass County's share $7,440 — splitting costs with Clay County; the Red River Regional Dispatch Center (RRRDC) will cover ongoing maintenance.
The Cass County Board of Commissioners authorized a one-time purchase of a supported data exporter for the county jail’s New World records system to reduce the risk of prolonged outages during system upgrades.
County IT staff explained the county has relied on custom software to export inmate data for the jail and public website; that custom tool has been vulnerable to extended outages when New World system-wide updates occur. The software is now a dependency for two operational systems — the Guard1 inmate tracking system and the ICS Communications phone system — increasing risks to daily operations if the export fails.
The county will purchase Tyler Technologies’ official exporter and split the cost with Clay County. Cass County’s share, as presented, is $7,440; RRRDC (Red River Regional Dispatch Center) will carry ongoing maintenance costs. The Sheriff's Office told the board the expense can be covered within its existing budget, so no budget adjustment is required.
A motion to authorize the IT director to approve the purchase of a jail exporter through the RRRDC for $7,440, with RRRDC to cover annual costs, was seconded by Commissioner Capitan and approved by roll-call vote.
Why it matters: County officials said the custom export tool has previously been taken offline during large-scale New World updates for periods the county estimates at "a couple days up to a week and a half," which now presents greater operational risk because other systems depend on that feed.
What was said: "In the event of a New World update...that being down for a week would be much more impactful than the website itself being down," Mr. Anderson said, describing the operational risk to jail staff. The Sheriff's Office confirmed available budget to cover the purchase.
Next steps: The IT director will proceed with the purchase through RRRDC and RRRDC will assume responsibility for ongoing maintenance and support.
