**GAO-02-948**                      Published: Aug 07, 2002. Publicly Released: Aug 07, 2002.                  

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## Highlights

Congress passed the D.C. Family Court Act of 2001 to reform court practices and establish procedures to improve interactions between the District of Columbia's Family Court, of D.C. Superior Court, and social service agencies in the District. The act directed the Mayor to prepare a plan to integrate the computer systems of District agencies with those of the Court. The fiscal year 2002 D.C. Appropriations Act authorized $200,000 for integrating the computer systems and $500,000 for social workers to implement family court reform. The act also required the Mayor to prepare a plan for these funds and mandated that the plan be issued on July 8, 2002. The Mayor's plan provides such useful information as (1) an outline of the District's current health and human services information technology environment and its information needs and limitations regarding the Family Court, (2) planned and possible short- and long-term initiatives to integrate the District's computer systems with those of the Family Court, (3) five technological integration priorities, and (4) how the $200,000 in appropriated funds will be spent. However, the District has not yet completed essential analyses, such as a requirements analysis, that would provide the basis for additional information. Based on GAO's analysis of the Mayor's plan for using the $500,000 in appropriated funds, it is not clear how the funds are to be used for social workers to implement family court reform, as required by law. The plan discusses the District's use of funds for service liaison, on-site coordination, and border agreement activities, but provides no detail on whether and how these activities involve social workers.

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## Topics

Information Technology

Appropriated fundsComputer networksComputer systemsComputersFunds managementInformation resources managementInformation systemsInteragency relationsStrategic planningFamily court