Florida County to move case files online.

• Author: Swartz, Nikki
• Position: UP FRONT

It's a tall order, but by next year, many of Broward County, Florida's paper court files could be accessible online. The plan, which is awaiting permission from the Florida Supreme Court, is for Broward to pay IT firm CGI $2 million to implement the new electronic document system.

According to the Miami Herald, the court system will also spend between $300,000 and $800,000 on software to remove Social Security numbers, bank account information, and other financial information before documents go online. The state legislature has ordered counties to remove such information from public records by January 1, 2008, due to identity theft concerns.

Broward County plans to post most active civil, criminal, traffic, and parking files on the court website. First to go online will be new Circuit Court civil cases and dosed felony cases, beginning from 1993. Closed civil cases will not be posted online because courts are required to keep them for only five years.

It could take about that long to post all the records the Supreme Court allows online, Barry Lasher, director of technology for the Broward County Clerk of Courts, told the Herald.

Currently, the public can go to www.browardclerk.org to verify that cases have been filed, the names of parties, sentences, and next court appearances. For $1, more details are available. But to view most court records, the public must visit the courthouse, which requires paying parking fees and waiting in line for files.

Broward County court officials cite several reasons to store records electronically:

* The county's storage space is limited, and it must store some documents for 75 years. The Herald reported that Broward County's Deerfield Beach warehouse currently holds 100,000 boxes, which CGI estimates contain 140 million pieces of paper.

* Records can be viewed online by judges, attorneys, and the public, simultaneously.

* Electronic storage...