Happy Holidays from Handel IT
It has been a tumultuous year in our country and in the world. The Presidential Election here in the U.S. certainly was different than any other election we have seen in recent history. Globally, hardly a day passes where we don’t read about another terror attack. For most of us, these unimaginable acts of hate are beyond comprehension. While we are not entirely free of terror here on US ground, I do believe we live in a very safe country. Of course, from my perspective in Laramie, Wyoming, the least populous state in the union, my viewpoint may be just a bit biased. As somebody who grew up in Norway, another country often ranked high for quality of life and other measures, I will argue that the United States is still one of the greatest countries in the world. This is still the land of opportunity. It is a land where we welcome ideas and support those who have ideas. With the perspective of almost 30 years in this country it is interesting to think that coming here as foreigner in 1988 and barely spoke English, only 9 years later, I had finished two degrees, worked for another entrepreneurial startup, and then started Handel IT in 1997. I can think of many other places in our world where such a series of events simply would not be able to unfold. We still continue to deal with a large number of challenges on our home front such as growing income inequality, a broken health care system, rising drug problems, slipping rankings on education, and increasing terrorist threats. I still believe when taken as a whole, our nation offers perhaps one of the best frameworks for individuals to succeed. We continue to rank high nationally in quality of life rankings, such as the one published by Numbeo https://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/rankings_by_country.jsp.
Looking at all the social services programs that we work with nationally, I remain in awe of the services that our clients provide to the people that they serve. In 2016 we have added several new customers, especially in the area of Tribal TANF (temporary assistance for needy families). You have probably heard me joke before that Rocket Science has nothing on TANF when it comes to complexity. In order to run a successful TANF program a Tribe (or a State for that matter) has to keep track of thousands of data points on each family that they serve. Calculating eligibility and keeping track of funding, measuring outcomes, and making sure allocations are being made according to all rules, are but a few of the tasks that a modern TANF program has to contend with. Doing so without a system like RiteTrack would be near impossible. It is such an honor for us to work with all these programs across the nation. One thing is resting assured that we are helping our customers with these very complex tasks. Even more important though are the services that our clients are providing to the families and individuals that they serve. More so than anything else, this is what I am the most proud of when it comes to Handel’s accomplishments. We want to thank you all for working with us in 2016. We are looking forward to continuing working with you and to add new customers to the RiteTrack family in 2017. Next year we will also be celebrating our 20th anniversary. Time flies when you are having fun. Until then I want to wish you the Happiest of Holidays and a Happy New Year!
-Even
New 2017 Funding Announcement for Tribes
The National Indian Child Welfare Association (NICWA) passed on the funding notification from The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, (SAMHSA) regarding SAMHSA “accepting applications for Systems of Care grants to support mental health services and systems for children, youth, and families in tribal communities.
The purpose of this infrastructure program is to provide tribal communities with the tools and resources to implement or expand a community-based, coordinated system of care model for children’s mental health.
Applications filed now are for funding beginning in October 2017.
NICWA facilitated a recorded webinar on November 10, 2016, to:
- Explain the purpose and goals of the funding opportunity;
- Walk through each element of the FOA and provide tips for successful applications;
- Encourage tribal applications; and
- Answer questions
You can listen to the recording of the full webinar here.
Tribal applications are encouraged! The deadline is January 3, 2017.
If you are still uncertain about applying after watching the webinar, please contact NICWA– they are happy to answer your questions where we can!”
“The purpose of this program is to improve behavioral health outcomes for children and youth (birth-21) with serious emotional disturbances (SED) and their families. This program will support the widescale operation, expansion, and integration of the SOC approach by creating sustainable infrastructure and services that are required as part of the Comprehensive Community Mental Health Services for Children and their Families Program (also known as the Children’s Mental Health Initiative or CMHI).
This cooperative agreement will support the provision of mental health and related recovery support services to children and youth with SED and those with early signs and symptoms of serious mental illness (SMI), including first episode psychosis (FEP), and their families.
The SOC Expansion and Sustainability Cooperative Agreements will build upon progress made in developing comprehensive SOC across the country by focusing on sustainable financing, cross-agency collaboration, the creation of policy and infrastructure, and the development and implementation of evidence-based and evidence-informed services and supports. Other activities supported will include the implementation of systemic changes, training, and workforce development.”
Additionally, the Circles of Care VII grant is available for application as well. ” The purpose of this program is to provide tribal and urban Indian communities with tools and resources to plan and design a holistic, community-based, coordinated system of care approach to support mental health and wellness for children, youth, and families. These grants are intended to increase the capacity and effectiveness of mental health systems serving AI/AN communities. Circles of Care grantees will focus on the need to reduce the gap between the need for mental health services and the availability and coordination of mental health, substance use, and co-occurring disorders in AI/AN communities for children, youth, and young adults from birth through age 25 and their families.”
The deadline for this funding opportunity is December 20, 2016.
Handel VP Hosts Webcast via NICWA about Improving Service Delivery with Software
Innovative Examples from Indian Country– Improving Service Delivery using Software and Technology, Handel Information Technologies software. The second in our “Technology Tools Webinar Series!”
In this, the second of our “Technology Tools Webinar Series,” we are excited to have Casey Bader, Vice President of Handel Information Technologies, Inc., share his knowledge about innovative ways tribes are using software and technology to engage with clients, integrate programs, improve service delivery, and secure funding. Some of these initiatives have received national recognition for innovative approaches to addressing community needs.
Casey and Handel Information Technologies, long time NICWA supporters, have presented numerous times at NICWA’s annual conference and have a wealth of experience in Indian Country. We are happy to have the opportunity to have them present to our NICWA members.
Casey has spent over 15 years designing and implementing innovative software solutions with RiteTrack for social service programs and is passionate about finding ways technology can improve service delivery and outcomes in Indian Country. His program focuses include Indian Child Welfare, Family Services, Tribal TANF, Employment and Training, Tribal Court and Treatment programs. Casey has a degree in Social Science with a minor in Sociology from the University of Wyoming.
Handel Relay Team Completes the 2016 Wild West Relay
Under the leadership of Casey Bader, employees from Handel, augmented by friends and family, formed another 12 person running team. Team Wyoming Endorfiends ran the 200 miles from Fort Collins, via Wyoming, to Steamboat, Colorado. Starting at 5:20 AM the morning of Friday, August 5th, the team finished in Steamboat about 32 hours later on Saturday afternoon.
This is the 6th time since we first did this in 2006 that Handel has formed a relay team. I find it to be a truly rewarding experience in so many ways, physically, beautiful scenery, social, and team building. Here is a video commemorating this year’s event.
Handel Vice President to Present at NINAETC Conference
Handel’s Vice President was selected to speak at this year’s National Indian and Native American Employment and Training Conference (NINAETC). Casey Bader will present to conference attendees on integrating data for tribal social service departments.
The presentation will focus on the potential benefits, likely challenges, and recognized best practices in these types of integrated systems evaluations.
Bader has presented at numerous conferences including the:
- 2015 National Tribal Child Support Association Conference
- 2013, 2014, and 2015 National Indian Child Welfare Association (NICWA) National American Indian Conferences on Child Abuse and Neglect
- 2012 and 2013 United South and Eastern Tribes (USET) Annual Meetings
- 2012 and 2013 TribalNet Conferences
- 2013 Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians (ATNI) Convention
This year’s NINAETC workshop will explore the benefits, challenges, and best practices involved with evaluating integrated solutions. Whether integrating government, tribal-developed, and/or third-party systems, the principles are similar.
Integrated systems minimize barriers to accessing services, enable better use of staff resources, and improve reporting on successes and/or needs to Tribal Council, funding sources, and members.
However, Tribes should create a financial and resource cost/benefit analysis and consider security and confidentiality requirements because these solutions may not always be the best option.
Bader has over 15 years of experience identifying barriers to, evaluating and implementing complex software solutions for social service organizations.
Past conference workshop topics have included engaging membership through technology, the White Earth Nation WE CARE service delivery model, and best practices for enterprise-wide software implementations.
Handel’s Steve Koenig Presents at Ohio Court Technology Conference
Steve Koenig, Sales Executive for juvenile facilities, presented on RiteTrack for Juvenile Facilities at the Ohio Judicial Conference Court Technology conference on April 25. Steve discussed difficulties related to three main areas within a juvenile facility: youth management, data reports/generation, and facility management.
Featured during the presentation were various pieces of RiteTrack functionality that addressed each of these issues. With youth management, RiteTrack saves information from multiple admissions and eliminates duplicate data entries and ensures continuity in client data.
Data reports from the solution include incident, restraints, seclusions and room confinement reports that detail situations so all staff are aware of the youths’ activities in the facility.
Facility management in the solution includes functionality for room assignments, client inventory, and a facility schedule among other features.
Additionally, attendees learned that RiteTrack follows many of the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) and American Correctional Association (ACA) standards and guidelines.
More than 200 attendees from various courts in Ohio participated in the conference.
Koenig is available to present a conferences on a wide array of juvenile facility technology topics including enterprise-wide software implementations, case management models, and interfacing with multiple technology solutions.
Contact us if you would like to book him for a conference session or on-site demonstration.
Handel Opens Office in Ohio
Handel has opened its first office in the Eastern time zone. Steve Koenig, former Director of the Perry Multi-County Juvenile Facility in New Lexington, Ohio, joined the Handel team as a Juvenile Justice Sales Executive and he will be working locally out of his office in Lancaster, Ohio. With the opening of this new office, Handel now operates in every time zone in the lower 48.
Handel is the creator of RiteTrack, and RiteTrack, a web-based information management software, is used by juvenile justice agencies throughout the country. It provides the primary means for caseworkers, administrators and other professionals to manage their clients and caseloads.
Handel Vice President Presents at NTCSA Conference
Handel’s Vice President was selected to speak at this year’s National Tribal Child Support Association (NTCSA) Conference and presented to conference attendees on integrating data for tribal social service departments.
The presentation focused on exploring the best practices and principles a tribal organization should evaluate when considering implementing an integrated, centralized database system.
Vice president Casey Bader has presented at numerous conferences including the:
- 2013, 2014, and 2015 National Indian Child Welfare Association (NICWA) National American Indian Conferences on Child Abuse and Neglect
- 2012 and 2013 United South and Eastern Tribes (USET) Annual Meetings
- 2012 and 2013 TribalNet Conferences
Bader is available to present at conferences on a wide array of technology and tribal topics including enterprise-wide software implementations; system-of-care, case management models; and integrating data from multiple departments onto a centralized database; among other topics.
This most recent workshop addressed the issues of “data silos” that are created from developed separate databases to track client and benefit information for a wide variety of programs such as ICW/CPS, TANF Services, Enrollment, Financial Assistance, and Treatment Services. Data silos are often created in part because of data security concerns and also because service applications have been developed under the supervision of different departments and administrators. In many Tribes this has resulted in disassociated applications that do not share data.
The implications of data silos are many: data in any given department may be erroneous and/or out of date; necessary and relevant updates to data (e.g., contact information, household changes, employment changes, etc.) are not shared across departments; reports are difficult and time-consuming to produce; supporting data for grant applications can be difficult to develop and show justification for; information for Tribal Council needs may be incomplete or erroneous; evaluation of long-term program efficacy cannot be reliably evaluated; members may be unaware of other available services that could benefit them; and evidence of the depth and breadth to which the Tribe is serving its members is unavailable.
Enrollment services can be considered the gateway to access of services for members, and it is the department in which base-level demographic data is collected and verified. Much of this same enrollment data is collected by other service departments for verification of benefits as well. An integrated solution provides the ability to have member data collected and verified in one place, shared with other departments (defined by security parameters) and updated by other departments that have security access to the shared data points.
Indian Child Welfare and Support services and programs may be especially impacted by the lack of integration of Tribal data. Causing it to be difficult to identify children in need of services or families in need of assistance; to identify potential foster families; protective services may lag; proactive preventive programs may be difficult to implement for children or families; court orders or other court documents may not be served in a timely manner; cases may not be adequately documented or updated; or relevant documents may not be associated with a case.
Ramsey County, MN Goes Live on RiteTrack Juvenile Justice Facilities Solution
The Ramsey County Community Corrections Department went live on its new RiteTrack Juvenile Justice system in March of 2015. Ramsey County originally partnered with Handel IT after selecting RiteTrack through a competitive bid process in 2014 to replace two separate systems that had managed their juvenile detention facility and residential facility, respectively. The project was begun with aggressive goals not only to combine the two facilities onto one system, but also to analyze business processes and then synthesize them between the two facilities, convert and merge data from the two previously disparate databases, maintain accurate JDAI reporting, and integrate with a data warehouse hosted by the State of Minnesota.
“This project has been a great test of RiteTrack’s powerful security model” says Even Brande, President and CEO of Handel. “It has accomplished one of the key goals of this project which was to reduce duplicate data entry since many of the youth spend time in both facilities at different times. Yet RiteTrack’s security ensures that staff in each facility can only see the data that is pertinent to what happens in that facility, yet shares common data between the two.”
“The outcome of this project has been of great benefit to both my users and myself as a system administrator,” according to Dan Merth, the Customer Project Manager for the software implementation. “We have accomplished all of the goals we had for the initial roll-out of RiteTrack. Two obsolete systems were combined into one intuitive web-based design that is capturing all of the critical client information our case managers need on a daily basis, as well as the high level data our management uses to track trends and focus resources such as staffing levels. The project was completed on time and on budget and I am eager to work with Handel on future customization and enhancements to Ramsey County’s RiteTrack application.”
Throughout the project, Handel’s standard process for implementation of a software system was utilized. This process began with business and systems analysis and was followed by a formal system design. After the design was officially signed off by both Ramsey County and Handel, customization was added on top of RiteTrack’s standard Juvenile Justice Facilities system. Data migrations and the subsequent data merge from the two legacy systems, report development, and the integration with the State of Minnesota data warehouse all happened in parallel with the software customization.
“Large and complex projects such as the Ramsey system have an incredible number of points where a project can run into problems. Especially when large numbers of tasks are running in parallel to each other the complexity of large enterprise-level systems can almost seem overwhelming. The key to project success is clear communication and synergy between the Project Managers and other key staff members on both sides. Ramsey County is a perfect case study in how software implementations should happen; it has been a huge pleasure working with Dan and his team and I am looking forward to a long and lasting relationship with their office,” said Ben McKay, Handel’s Project Manager for the Ramsey software solution.
“The design and development process went better than any other large scale software project I have been involved in,” said Dan. Handel’s design model includes screen mockups and descriptions of each function to ensure that there are no surprises when development begins. Additionally, Handel’s customer support has been excellent, it is nice to know that Ramsey County Corrections has partnered with a responsible vendor who cares just as much as I do about data and reporting accuracy, system functionality, and customer service.”
Ramsey County is currently pursuing a second phase to their RiteTrack project to add additional functionality to further enhance their ability to serve youth in the juvenile justice system.
“We are very thrilled to having had the opportunity to work with Ramsey County on this project” says Even Brande. “Not only are we looking forward to many years of working with Ramsey County but we also believe this solution will be a model for other communities who are in a similar situation.”
For more information on a selection of the technical processes that were incorporated into the Ramsey project and Handel’s Juvenile Justice Solution please see: