Government

Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)

Responding to FOIA requests from the public can be time consuming and ineffectual for government agencies if manual and physical processes are in use. Manually processing paper-based requests may pose unnecessary challenges and delays which can impact response time.

Process and content management solutions can expedite FOIA requests by simplifying how response documents and communications are handled every step of the way. With FOIA software solutions, employees can quickly and easily access citizen requests, internal reviews, and responses whenever they are needed, from any location.

Government FOIA software empowers your agency by:

Collecting FOIA requests regardless of the method in which they are received (phone call, fax, letter, email, or e-form).
Directing FOIA requests to the dedicated FOIA worker or processor, with notifications to management, if need be.
Ensuring private information conforms with industry-standard security mandates.
Affordably build small, integrated solutions that can be scaled when you need them to be — now or in the future.
Receiving simultaneous upgrades without having to improve multiple custom-coded point solutions.

Eligibility Determination

Solutions for eligibility determination enables agency staff to capture, store, safeguard, and retrieve the necessary documents needed to support compliance and program delivery. By automating processes, the need for paper is eliminated, freeing up staff to work on higher-value tasks such as service, referrals, and one-on-one support with constituents.

Utilizing a content services platform with integrated case management functionality, allows agency staff to safely manage and streamline cases along with the supporting documentation and data associated with it. Each case has a workflow associated with it — either structured or ad hoc (allowing the user to determine where it will go next), where users will have assigned tasks and can collaborate on each case. This solution automates data entry and routing of all documents after initial capture, ensuring your agency never misplaces another record again. A content services platform also provides field staff with instant access to pertinent information without having to tow around heavy paper files.

With solutions for eligibility determination, staff can automate processes and provide self-service and online access, allowing clients to serve themselves.

A single platform with case management, document management, workflow, and collaboration is a differentiator compared to other content services platforms. Many content services platforms integrate with case management and CRM type solutions. However, few, if any, platforms have both case management and content services capabilities in a configurable manner. Case management with complete content services functionality, including workflow, results in enterprise-capable information management and automation. This is the strength of All Star’s solution.

Housing & Human Services

Housing and Human Services agencies face budgetary constraints and smaller staff sizes as the need to stretch a dollar has have become the norm. Housing staff must learn to do more with less while continue managing tenants, properties, and a high volume of program documentation in the most efficient ways possible. Workers are tasked with numerous responsibilities such as re-certifying housing eligibility, assisting homebuyers, and overseeing subsidized properties for IRS, HOME, and other government-supported programs.

In addition to managing a wide range of services, agencies need to ensure that critical program documentation is secure yet easily accessible to your agency staff. With solutions for eligibility determination, housing agencies can manage the vital documents required to ensure compliance while fulfilling program objectives.

For housing and human services agencies, these solutions eradicate the expenses related to paper and manual processing and storage, thus providing a more expeditious and cost-effective method across the board.

Affordable Housing

With solutions for eligibility determination solutions, agencies can fully automate their outdated manual processes, ensuring that tenants, property subsidies, and constituents meet federal requirements.

Thanks to a content management platform, agencies can safely store all mandatory documentation, including applications and certifications in one central repository. This streamlined process greatly assists staff in overseeing workloads while ensuring compliance. Staff can focus on providing important referrals instead of being buried in paper.

Additionally, a content services platform integrates seamlessly with databases, regardless of the program. This solution is beneficial as agency staff can access information instantly without the need for training since it is a system they already use.

Staff can also retrieve essential information stored in documents when they are in the field on tablets or smartphones, providing greater mobility and enhanced client-facing productivity.

Constituent Engagement & Application Processing

One of the initial interactions a government agency has with its constituents is the application process. As you may have encountered, the preferred method of submitting applications can differ among constituents. Some individuals may not feel as comfortable with using technology and favor paper applications, while other constituents want instantaneous application access via the web or a mobile device.

Since the goal is to capture and process your constituents’ information, you will have to be willing and able to interact using their desired method of communication. This process starts with offering a variety of channels for constituents to select from, including mobile, web, or paper-based. The information is automatically sent to your agency’s existing system to fast-track processing, bolster communication, and improve efficiency.

Automating your application processing can dramatically enhance constituent engagement for business licenses, public assistance programs, workforce development programs, and more.

Streamlining your agency’s application process will allow you to:

Instantly capture images, forms, and supporting documents directly into a constituent’s file regardless if you are in the field or the office.
Manage your entire application process electronically.
Lessen manual work while optimizing your current technology with integration to your core systems.
Further your agency’s digital transformation by freeing staff from manual tasks, allowing them to focus on serving constituents.

Public Assistance Program Onboarding & Case Management

Government agencies that provide public assistance programs such as unemployment, medical benefits, financial aid, and food assistance are vital to constituents in need. Time-consuming paperwork and manual processes can impede the process of getting these critical services to members of your community when they need it most.

Digitizing your public assistance programs can foster greater collaboration, safeguard essential documents, and allow staff to access critical information at any given moment. Optimizing your public assistance programs provides caseworkers and staff with the updated information they require to properly evaluate cases and make the best-informed decisions with faster turnaround time.

Automated processes can significantly change how constituents enroll or file claims in person, via the web, mobile, fax, or phone, dramatically eliminating slow paper-based case management activities. Since all of the data is in the case file, workers can access related documents, tasks, and notes while behind the scenes, a workflow process is moving the case to the appropriate worker at the appropriate time. Documents, data, and workflow are three capabilities part of one application that has that enormous functionality.

Ultimately, you’ll be more successful at managing your program benefit processes at every stage, make quicker benefit determinations, and allow caseworkers to assist constituents more and less time processing paper.

Constituent Onboarding

Your application process is usually the first interaction you will have with constituents who are providing information for government programs, including public assistance program enrollment. Therefore, you must make a positive first impression from the start.

Application automation streamlines the collection and processing of constituent information for government programs and enables you to interact with constituents in the manner they have specified.

Implementing an application automation solution will assist your agency by:

Accelerating enrollment and processing procedures while reducing operating risk.
Providing caseworkers with a comprehensive view of benefits and clients.
Managing caseloads by automatically capturing, authenticating, and routing applications while helping to prevent bottlenecks.
Automating obligatory reporting and ensuring all case information is accessible, thus, providing better oversight of the benefits lifecycle.

Grants Management & Compliance

Grants compliance is comprised of a series of critical steps — from grant submission to the review process and beyond. However, many agencies become backlogged with sluggish manual paper-based processes. Implementing a grants management system solution provides agencies with a quicker, more efficient way to receive, review, and manage grants. You can safely store all required grant documentation while automating compliance tasks — guaranteeing funding is spent only when mandatory tasks and federal requirements are met.

Integrating a grants management system allows agency specialists to manage individual projects better. Moreover, a grants management system solution allows pre-audit sampling of program documents, enabling program directors to verify that programs meet the required documentation and compliance guidelines. Furthermore, the solution shows pertinent staff documentation for data records as well as what necessary documents are missing, aiding agencies in their compliance efforts.

Staff can also access and retrieve essential information stored in documents from a tablet or smartphone, providing greater mobility, increased flexibility, and enhanced productivity while in the field.

Planning & Public Works

Planning and Public Works is an integral part of a community, encompassing a wide range of government services, including community development and infrastructure planning initiatives and more. Your constituents rely on your department to provide them with the essentials to sustain their quality of life in the neighborhood they call home.

Integrating solutions to manage your planning and public works projects effectively is vital to ensuring that critical documentation, such as policies and physical assets, are government compliant. Your staff gets the immediate access they need to keep projects on track as well as on budget.

For planning and public works, these solutions eliminate the expenses related to paper and manual processing and storage, while optimizing staff time and budgets.

Policy & Procedure Administration

Keeping your government agency staff abreast of the latest changes to policy and procedures is fundamental to how your agency operates. The days of relying on haphazardly placed policy memos, correspondence, and reference documents are over.

Using a Policy and Procedure Administration solution creates a streamlined approach to disseminate, acknowledge, and store government policies all from a single location. Your staff can be immediately informed of the most updated policies regarding government mandates, agency standards, and regulations. All policy updates are electronically archived, which supports compliance.

Using this solution allows you to automatically notify every member of your staff about new, modified, or canceled policies. All staff can electronically confirm that they have read and accepted the update, ensuring receipt. A comprehensive report details the distribution of new policies and identifies who has read and acknowledged them.

With a Policy and Procedure Administration solution your government agency can:

Automate processes allowing caseworkers to make informed decisions faster without being bogged down by paper processing.
Capture and categorize submitted data from a variety of formats, including handwritten documents, faxes and emails, and route information to multiple locations to be processed. This solution allows for lower operational costs and higher operational efficiency.

RPA in Law Enforcement

Having a job in law enforcement and public safety is about maintaining law and order in your community while responding to a multitude of situations. Even during the most stress-filled scenarios, ensuring that all information is complete, timely, and accurate is critical. After an incident has occurred, this information will be shared with the courts and other agencies for investigative and legal purposes.

A law enforcement solution can speed up police and fire emergency response by giving first responders instantaneous access to vital records and information, such as plans, maps, infrastructure data, and unique circumstances. Replacing your paper files with virtual files enables you to share files with your team at any time quickly.

Create a central location for law enforcement records
Securely share records between multiple agencies
Enable mobile court case management
Improve legislative transparency
Integrated court case management and jail management

Government Asset Management Software

Managing project assets can be an overwhelming task as multiple reviews and collaborators become involved in the process. With an asset management solution, a central repository stores all the content you need to maintain your assets and complete reviews, inspections, and other key processes. This automated solution allows you to accelerate projects while enabling reviews to happen concurrently. This process fosters greater collaboration while enabling multiple staff to have immediate access to secure documents in the field using laptops, tablets, and smartphones.

Asset management software effortlessly connects to permitting and planning solutions like your existing in-house databases, Cityworks®, and Accela Automation®, making your data and documents linked. This solution also enables you to oversee plan revisions, contracts, and CAD drawings from the applications your staff uses daily.

Also, this solution enables you to automate processes and provide online access to constituents in a self-serve capacity, freeing you and your staff to work on higher-value tasks.

Electronic Plan Review

Community development and infrastructure initiatives are comprised of many components, including the all-important review process. Unfortunately, manual processes can cause significant slow-downs, hindering the entire planning review phase — making the approval stage seem like a far-off vision.

An electronic plan review solution manages and automates the whole review process from the eplan submission, review, and certification process. Having an end-to-end, automated solution accelerates community development and infrastructure projects, bringing plans to life.

With an electronic plan review solution, you can automate and manage the entire review process from submission to final approval by offering:

One central location to securely store all plans and related documents.
Automated version and revision management.
Reporting dashboards that display plan status, allowing complete transparency.
Valuable tools for collaboration in real-time.
Integrations to permitting solutions.

A plan review solution automates without expensive custom code and services. The automation is configurable, saleable, and connects to your other essential systems without the need for costly custom code. This solution enables you to extract information from your permitting solutions like Cityworks or Esri and provide the content your reviewers require.

Esri Integrations

GIS solutions have completely transformed the way that government agencies review and evaluate data — bringing geographical information to a whole new level. Utilizing maps, GIS users can gather information detailing infrastructure like roads and bridges, water and sewer systems, as well as health and safety incidents. Esri Integrations enables GIS users to open supporting documents directly from the maps they use, accelerating processes like reviews and approvals. With the platform, you can capture and secure documents.

An additional benefit of the platform is that it’s fully automated, allowing you to capture and secure documents without the need for manual paper processing, which is time-consuming and harmful to the environment. The platform enables staff to access documents via a mobile device, which provides greater service to your constituents.

Moreover, the platform evolves as current product improvements supporting the most updated Esri GIS advancements. Since the platform connects with other GIS solutions like Cityworks, your staff can readily access documents from the new Cityworks Server Silverlight map, which displays maps and information in a single screen format.

With a content services platform, you automate processes and offer constituents self-service and online access, allowing your staff to perform higher-value tasks.

Integration of Accela

A common denominator for most government agencies, including planning and public works departments, is to make the most of what is given. This usually translates to better leveraging of existing resources such as your IT investment. By doing so, you increase the chances that there will be enough funds for future projects.

Integrating a content services platform with Accela Automation® offers immediate and secure access to drawings and documents for developers, engineers, inspectors, project managers, and more. A solution also makes it simpler for planning teams to find the documents and answers they need, helping projects run quickly, smoothly, and as efficiently as possible. Moreover, having an automated system means no paper or manual processing to slow down progress. Having a project finish on time or ahead of schedule equates to more savings for your department.

By integrating a content services platform with Accela Automation, public works departments can:

Provide users immediate access to information at any time, from any location.
Link connected systems and processes while eliminating paper as well as manual and physical processes.
Safeguard documents and manage retention automatically.

Cityworks

The foundation for building vibrant communities is comprised of constituents and staff who strive to work together for the greater good. Having the necessary tools that drive productivity and promote collaboration is essential to this process. Integrating a robust content services platform and Cityworks®, which provides a consistent view of your information, enables users to access work orders and supporting documents straight from the maps they work with. This solution allows for staff to obtain the information they need to perform their jobs at a quicker rate, driving efficiency.

By integrating Cityworks and a content services platform, you can seamlessly connect content with numerous tasks such as permitting, licensing, and land use. Additionally, this solution will allow you to shift information and projects into a well-organized electronic plan review workflow. All the content you and your staff need to maintain assets are securely stored in a single repository that easily integrates with your current asset management solution.

Connecting Cityworks to your existing asset management platform means:

Users can immediately access information at any time from their desks or via mobile devices.
Content modifications are securely tracked and recorded for the duration of the project and afterward.
Content can be connected linked to Esri GIS applications.

Tempest Prospero

For many communities, creating an efficient permitting application delivery process that is transparent, user-friendly, and seamless for constituents, developers, contractors, and business owners can be burdensome. One major obstacle to having an effective community development process is the different software solutions and paper-based permitting and plan review burdens.

With Tempest Prospero, a powerful enterprise-wide solution, you can seamlessly have the work of several departments brought together to create a centralized source of information for permits, deposits, hearings, and more. Enhancing your Tempest solution with Electronic Plan Review results in paperless management of plan sets, markups, site photos, and as-builts.

From the moment plans are submitted, staff can promptly connect the permitting data and projects with electronic plan review software. This solution allows for a smooth, paperless experience throughout the permit, license, and application process to plan review and final approval.

With Tempest and a content services platform working in unison, you have a single repository for all content — making it easy to access from one place. No longer will staff have to waste precious time looking in multiple files and locations for engineering studies, photos, plans, and other applicable project data. Also, storing permits, licenses, and other documents for an unlimited amount of time makes that information available at any given time for staff, offering reliable data to all parties involved now and in the future.