The vendor required to provide regulatory licensing, enforcement, case management, workflow, document management, customer-facing portal capabilities, payment and fees collection and integration with existing city financial programs.
- Strategic goals
• Consolidate systems to reduce operational risk, improve maintainability, and reduce dependency on legacy infrastructure
• Empower division staff with modern configuration tools (wizards, templates, admin screens) to set up new regulatory programs without external project work
• Modernize customer experience with an online portal for license application, renewal, document submission, and payment
• Enable real-time integration with city financial systems (storm treasury, PeopleSoft accounts payable)
• Streamline enforcement workflows with automated case management, structured workflow routing, mobile inspection support, and integration with RSI government premier (for enforcement requests), as well as the municipal court systems.
• Support complex regulatory logic including multi-tier fee structures, dynamic penalty calculations, grace periods, and enforcement escalation.
- Functional requirements
A. Core functional areas
1. Regulatory licensing and lifecycle management
• Issuance: capture business customer information (name, address, contact); store license-specific data (lot size, unit count, location, etc.) Per program; generate and print and email license documents; track license status and renewal dates
• Renewals: manage annual renewal cycles; generate and send renewal notices; process renewal applications online and offline; track renewal status
• Modification and amendment: capture changes to license data; maintain full audit trail of who changed what and when; support amendment workflows (e.g., location change, ownership change)
• Termination and revocation: capture license closure or revocation events; track reason and date; update financial obligations status
• Accounts receivable: process payments (mail-in, in-person, online); track payment history; record voids, write-offs, and adjustments; generate invoices; calculate and apply late fees and penalties
2. Complex fee and penalty structures
• Annual base fees with optional one-time setup charges
• Tiered fees based on business tier and level (e.g., small, medium, large)
• Category-based fees (e.g., retailer vs. producer in cannabis industry)
• Size-based fees (e.g., by vehicle count, location count, square footage, stall count)
• Frequency options (annual, quarterly, half-year renewals)
• Pass-through fees
• Proration logic based on application date or fixed renewal date
• Late fee and penalty escalation with grace periods, daily and per-occurrence rates, and higher rates after grace period
• Interest charges on overdue amounts (if applicable per program)
3. Enforcement, case management, and delinquent account tracking
• Case creation and assignment: create enforcement cases for violations, overdue licenses, or discovery investigations; assign cases to inspectors and supervisors
• Integration from RSI government premier: create enforcement cases for tax delinquency upon receiving a request from RSI GP
• Case activity tracking: log investigation activities, interviews, inspections, and outcomes; attach evidence and notes; track case status and disposition
• Delinquent account workflows: automated or semi-automated workflows for delinquent license tracking:
o Education and awareness notices
o Demand letters
o Final notice before citation
o Citation generation and referral to city municipal court
o Follow-up and resolution tracking
• Penalty and interest calculation: correctly apply late penalties and interest per program-specific rules during enforcement
• License actions: support suspension, revocation, or reinstatement of licenses based on enforcement outcomes
• Notice and communication generation: produce formal notices, citations, and statements of account; track communication history with customers (email, phone, mail)
• Mobile support: enable field inspectors to access and update case data, inspection results, and photos on mobile devices with offline capability when necessary
4. Inspections management
• Inspection scheduling: create and schedule inspections for regulatory compliance; track inspection types (routine, complaint-driven, discovery)
• Inspection tracking: record inspection date, time, location, findings, violations noted, and inspector notes
• Checklists and custom fields: support program-specific inspection templates with customizable checklists, dropdowns, and categorical choices
• Outcome recording: capture compliance and non-compliance findings; generate inspection reports; flag violations for enforcement follow-up
• Mobile inspection forms: enable field capture of inspection data on mobile devices with ability to attach photos and signatures
• Integration with enforcement: link inspection outcomes to case management and enforcement workflows
5. Document management and storage
• Document capture and attachment: store documents submitted by customers and generated by staff (licenses, renewals, inspections, notices, citations)
• Document linking: link documents to relevant licensing, enforcement, or inspection records
• Authorized access control: ensure appropriate role-based access to documents (e.g., staff view, public view if applicable)
• Storage options: support options for on-premises, cloud, or hybrid storage
• Retention and archival: support retention schedules and secure archival of closed cases per city records management policy
6. Workflow and business process automation
• Workflow design and configuration: admin tools to set up custom workflows for licensing, renewals, enforcement, and inspections
• Date triggers and notifications: automated triggers based on expiration date, grace period end, penalty thresholds; notifications to staff and customers
• Escalation rules: automatic escalation of overdue items to supervisors or enforcement teams
• Approval chains: route workflows to appropriate managers and supervisors for approval before finalizing actions
• Exception handling: ability to waive fees, override penalties, or extend due dates with audit trail and authorization controls
• Branching logic: support conditional routing (if-then-else) for complex enforcement paths
7. Customer-facing portal
• License application: online submission of new regulatory license applications with required fields, file uploads, and e-signatures
• Customer email and other communications: provide integrated email functionality that allows authorized users to compose, send, and track email messages directly within the application user interface, without requiring microsoft outlook or any other desktop email client.
• Email communications sent from the system shall be subject to the city’s existing retention, e‑discovery, and communication compliance policies in the enterprise email environment
• License renewal: online submission of renewal applications; auto-population of existing customer and license data
• Payment processing: integrated online payment capability for license fees, renewals, and outstanding balances; support credit and debit card and ach
• Document upload: customers submit required supporting documents (e.g., certificates, inspection reports, proof of insurance)
• Status tracking: customers view application status, renewal status, payment history, and outstanding obligations
• Correspondence and notices: customers receive and respond to notices, citations, and requests for information
• License viewing: customers download and print issued licenses and renewal notices
• Multi-language and ADA compliant in accordance with web content accessibility guidelines (WCAG) 2.: accessible interface in english and other languages commonly used by city business community (to be specified by city staff)
8. Reporting and analytics
• Standard reports: pre-built reports on licensing volume, renewal status, collections, overdue accounts, enforcement activity, and program performance
• Ad-hoc reporting: query builder or reporting tool allowing division staff to create custom reports filtered by program, date, status, inspector, etc.
• Dashboards: visual dashboards showing key metrics (licenses active, pending, expired; revenue collected; overdue accounts; enforcement cases open)
• Export capability: export data to excel, csv, pdf for analysis and external sharing
• Data integrity reporting and compliance to retention rules: audit reports showing system changes, user actions, and data quality metrics
B. Integration requirements
1. City systems integration
• Storm (city treasury operations revenue management): real-time or near-real-time synchronization of division trust account balances; reconciliation of payments to regulatory obligations; support for city-wide payment routing and settlement
• Peoplesoft: account payable interface for invoicing of regulatory enforcement services (e.g., false alarm fees) and receipt of vendor services
• Accela (enterprise permitting, inspection, compliance): query of regulatory license status for four existing regulatory programs currently in Accela
• Government premier: data exchange to synchronize business license information (status, tax obligations) for programs requiring active business license; one-way read of RSI license data
• Kubra (city payment processing): integration with existing city payment processing platform for online regulatory payments and automated reconciliation
• ECM and SharePoint: optional integration with city document management system for document storage and retrieval (per architecture chosen during planning)
2. Data exchange specifications
• Frequency: support for real-time, near-real-time (hourly), and batch (nightly) data exchange as appropriate per integration
• Format: support for rest APIS, soap, secure ftp, or database-to-database replication as appropriate
• Error handling: automated alerting and retry logic for failed integrations; audit trail of all exchanges
• Data mapping: proposal should outline approach to mapping division data model to external systems and vice versa; high-level conceptual mapping should be provided.
