Project Background

With over 300 courts in approximately 200 locations, courts of limited jurisdiction are the workhorses of Washington's judicial system.

CLJ courts process about 2 million cases every year - approximately 87% of the state's judicial caseload. Along with the enormous caseload, the district and municipal courts collect more than $250 million annually in fines, fees, and assessments that help fund the justice system.

The existing case management and accounting system used by district and municipal courts is aging 1980's technology that no longer meets the business needs of the CLJ courts, probation offices, and criminal justice partners. With ever-increasing workloads and shrinking budgets, today's courts and probation offices are in dire need of a modern system that can keep pace with the needs of today's busy courts - and the expectations of the public - to efficiently manage the thousands of cases they deal with every day, and to help them fairly and effectively administer justice.

Under the leadership of the state Supreme Court's Judicial Information System (JIS) Committee, the Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) operates the statewide information network that supports the daily operations of the courts. It also serves as the statewide database for criminal history information used by courts and partner criminal justice agencies. JIS clients include judicial officers, court managers and staff, probation officers, local law enforcement, prosecutors, defense attorneys, the Washington State Patrol, Department of Corrections, Department of Licensing, and the Secretary of State.

Replacing a major legacy system is a multi-year effort and a multi-million-dollar investment. The CLJ-CMS Project recently finalized a contract with Tyler Technologies for a commercial off-the-shelf suite of products for case management, probation, and eFiling for Washington's district and municipal courts and probation offices. The work is anticipated to begin in September 1, 2020 and will take approximately five years.