Case Study: Douglas County

Case Study

Douglas County is located between Colorado’s two largest cities, Denver and Colorado Springs, and has a population of just over 308,000 people. Douglas County is an excellent model of a government that utilizes POSSE as an enterprise-wide solution, with their Building, Planning, and Engineering departments all integrated within the web-based work management system. Beginning with the Building system, which went live in 2006, Computronix and Douglas County have worked together to implement POSSE across their departments, and they are constantly working to improve their business processes and serve the citizens of Douglas County more efficiently.

“Because our departments work so closely together, we need a system that allows us to share data quickly and easily. Using POSSE, separate departments can
simultaneously share and review a document, rather than waiting for a hard copy to make its way between multiple people reviewing it individually.”

Steve Koster
Assistant Planning Director
Douglas County, CO

The Challenge

The benefit of using POSSE as a single, enterprise-wide solution is that it greatly simplifies the communication between departments.

Before using POSSE, there were major delays when Douglas County officials needed to share paperwork between departments, with a system that involved color-coded papers and numerous emails or phone calls to coordinate document approval and transferal. Now, there are notifications automatically sent to the next department in the chain when one department is done with a permit or document.

“One of the key selling points of POSSE was its ability to be configured to meet the specific demands of our business.”

Korby Lintz
Chief Building Official
Douglas County

The Solution

Douglas County is a strong advocate for the importance of Open Data, and POSSE readily facilitates their desires for openness and transparency, without requiring a significant effort from County staff. They are easily able to publish data from POSSE online, allowing citizens to be informed while improving government accountability and transparency.

As a self-enabled agency with a very capable IT division, Douglas County is able to work within POSSE to create custom configurations as their needs require. Because it is a single integrated system, any changes or configurations are available instantly across all departments.

By using POSSE, Douglas County has been able to meet their goals of continuous improvement, and serving their citizens more effectively by leveraging technology, and they plan to continue doing so for many years.

Key accomplishments from this project include:

The benefit of using POSSE as a single, enterprise-wide solution is that it greatly simplifies the communication between departments. Before using POSSE, there were major delays when Douglas County officials needed to share paperwork between departments, with a system that involved color-coded papers and numerous emails or phone calls to coordinate document approval and transferal. Now, there are notifications automatically sent to the next department in the chain when one department is done with a permit or document.

Land developers also directly benefit as a result of the county government using POSSE. Because the software streamlines workflows through a set process, developers are able to get up-to-date reports on the decisions made, be notified quickly when they need to submit paperwork or information, and schedule developments more accurately due to the timelines associated with the POSSE processes.

Developers have said that the Douglas County permitting system is the best in Colorado, thanks to its ease of navigation, comprehensive and powerful features, and ready accessibility to key information. Being able to have all their building processes integrated within POSSE has ultimately saved Douglas County a significant amount of time, money, and paper.

POSSE’s builtin reporting tools have made diagnosing problems and inefficiencies significantly easier. This helps Douglas County staff to stay on track, and to learn and plan to make the county government processes even more efficient and waste-free.

“Whatever we need, POSSE has been able to provide as far as process management. It is such a solid, configurable product and they (Computronix) are so open to inventing new things with us. Where there is process, there should be POSSE, and local government is really nothing but a punch of processes, so POSSE should be pervasive in every government organization.”

Terence Quinn
Director of Community Development
Douglas County, CO

The Results

Reduced amount of paper used and time spent.

Simplifies communication between departments.

Allows citizens to have easy access to important information.

Gives developers the timelines and reports they need to plan their developments.

Allows internal developers the freedom to configure the system the way the business needs.

Keeps staff on-track and accountable.

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