The New Jersey Department of Community Affairs (NJDCA) is a state agency that offers administrative guidance, financial aid and technical assistance to local agents. They provide programs and services that address public concerns, including fire, building and elevator safety, housing inspection, community development, and local government management and finance.
There are several bureaus and units within the department responsible for performing crucial safety inspections across the community and for enforcing the applicable New Jersey state codes:
- The Bureau of Fire Code Enforcement inspects high-rise buildings and structured with life hazard uses (like multiple story atriums and industrial kitchens). They also manage public education programs and oversee firefighter training.
- The Bureau of Housing Inspection ensures proper maintenance of hotels and multiple dwelling buildings like apartments to safeguard resident health, safety, and wellbeing.
- The Elevator Safety Unit oversees compliance of elevators with safety standards to protect against injury risks related to equipment and maintenance.
The NJDCA took the opportunity to harness the full power of their core business applications by investing in innovation to modernize their systems, creating actionable insights and empowering faster decision-making. In collaboration with IBM Consulting® for Microsoft, they created state-of-the-art cloud-based mobile centric systems to optimally manage registration, inspection, enforcement, billing, and payment processes.
The main challenges that they addressed were: outdated and often paper-based inspection processes across various bureaus, fragmented IT infrastructure, and inefficient use of labor and time. Additionally, the existing systems were expensive to maintain, susceptible to frequent downtimes, and did not meet the needs of public users or governmental employees.
The NJDCA sought the expertise of IBM Consulting for Microsoft to create a comprehensive solution that could address their concerns.
The collaboration between NJDCA and IBM Consulting for Microsoft has resulted in cloud-based inspection solutions for multiple programs. This modernized inspection framework, built using Microsoft Dynamics 365 and the Power Platform, enables agencies to effectively achieve their goals and enhance public safety across the state.
The solution components include:
- Mobile App: Inspectors use mobile devices to login and record results while in the field.
- Back-office: Staff leverage Microsoft Dynamics 365 platform for tasks like processing registrations, managing appeals and extensions, reviewing accounting, and assessing inspector productivity and performance.
- Public Portal: Property owners and agents use Microsoft Power Pages to register properties, obtain inspection records and certificates, and pay bills online.
The new inspection solution offers a range of features and capabilities designed to optimize various processes and improve overall efficiency such as automated notifications, document management, advanced analytics for fiscal and staff utilization reporting, and monitoring of permits tied to properties.
The implementation of the new cloud-based inspection solution improved public safety and inspection management by optimizing workflows and modernizing end-to-end processes, while enhancing usage of mobile devices for better accessibility and ease of use. As a result, NJDCA is seeing a reduction in inspection backlogs from multiple years to zero to six months for housing inspection and a reduction of elevator inspection cycle time of up to 90%.
As part of the new platform, all the data is now centralized through the Microsoft Government Cloud, a security-rich environment which addresses various legacy systems, data security, and compliance. Payment management has significantly improved through the integration of Power Pages with the New Jersey Government payment system using Microsoft Azure. This integration enhanced user experience through features like quick pay which allows users to view bill details and make payments without the need to login.
Additionally, revenue management is automated with Microsoft Power Automate, reducing costs, saving time, and eliminating potential human errors in billing, print distribution, postage handling, and monitoring procedures. Revenue increased by 46% for the housing inspection program and 15% for the fire safety inspection program. Moreover, the transformation provided the agency with state-of-the-art Business Intelligence (BI) dashboards and reporting capabilities, powered by Microsoft Power BI.
As a continued part of this modernization initiative, IBM Consulting for Microsoft is now implementing Azure Open AI based scheduling optimization, real-time visibility of inspector and inspection statuses, as well as mobile off-line capabilities.
The New Jersey Department of Community Affairs (NJDCA) (link resides outside of ibm.com) is the state agency created to provide administrative guidance, financial support and technical assistance to local governments, community development organizations, businesses and individuals to improve the quality of life in New Jersey. NJDCA offers programs and services that respond to issues of public concern, including fire and building safety, housing production, community planning and development, and local government management and finance.
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