New Police Computer System Has Glitches, Tends to Crash

A $16-million police computer system that was funded through a highly touted venture between city officials and private contributors has been plagued by glitches, is prone to crashing and is operating at 40% of its capacity, city officials said Monday.

The system for the Los Angeles Police Department was funded by “The Mayor’s Alliance,” a group of private contributors brought together by Mayor Richard Riordan to bring the entire department into the computer age.

So far, the system has been connected to 13 police divisions, providing 700 workstations. With completion scheduled for June, it is expected to be connected throughout the department with 1,250 workstations.

But police officials acknowledged that the job of designing and installing the system was beyond the expertise of the police staff and city computer experts. They also said they underestimated the cost of the system.

“We honestly miscalculated the scope” of the work, Police Cmdr. Bill Russell told the City Council’s Public Safety Committee.

Although the system was initially tested at the West Valley Division in Reseda, it was expanded to 12 other police divisions before the “bugs were worked out,” he said.

“We built it on the fly and whether we should have done that is neither here nor there,” Russell said.

Russell said the system has crashed each time it was added at a new division and has had problems handling large amounts of data. A report submitted to the committee said the system has also been plagued by computer viruses.

Russell said the system is working at 40% of its capacity because the city has yet to add the more complicated customized applications that he described only as “the bells and whistles” of the system.

Russell’s report drew the ire of the Riordan administration and participants in the Mayor’s Alliance, who said Russell overstated the problems in the system.

“It’s not a computer fiasco,” said Noelia Rodriguez, Riordan’s press deputy. While she acknowledged some problems in the system, she said glitches were expected.

“There is no question that when you are going from ground zero and introducing technology on this scale, there will be challenges,” she said.

Mary Odell, president of Riordan’s philanthropic foundation and a key organizer in the Mayor’s Alliance, also attacked Russell’s characterization that the system was put together “on the fly.”

“I think he misrepresented some of the problems seriously,” she said.

Odell added that when the system was designed, it was tested by Fluor Daniel Corp., an engineering company that contributed its expertise to the design of the system.

She also said that the alliance provided a $500,000 training grant to USC to train police and city officials to use the system.

Other city officials said there was open speculation that the city did not have the experts to design and install the massive system.

“I’m not surprised whatsoever,” said Councilwoman Laura Chick, who heads the Public Safety Committee. Although she supports the effort, Chick said she has been raising questions about the system for more than a year.

To solve the computer problems, she said the city may have to raise additional funds and hire outside computer experts to make the system work as it was designed.

“We are talking about moving the LAPD and the entire city into the 21st century,” she said. “To get to where we want to go we have to acquire some major talent and expertise.”

Russell told the committee that he plans to hold a meeting with the city’s top computer experts within two weeks to discuss possible solutions to the system’s problems and to estimate the cost of such solutions.

Despite the problems, the system has already provided police the ability to write reports on computer and file copies into a mainframe system. Police had previously written most reports on paper forms filed in folders.

The system also allows police to send electronic messages to each other and to access local, state and federal criminal databases and research state criminal and civil codes.

Funding provided through the Clinton administration’s highly touted crime bill will pay to provide laptop computers so that police can write reports while on patrol.

The entire system was intended to cut down on the amount of time police spend on paperwork.

Despite the glitches, Russell said the system has already dramatically reduced the time and paperwork that police spend doing their day-to-day reports.

But because of the problems, he suggested that the city delay further installation of the system in five additional police divisions, including the department’s anti-gang unit.