Maori Land Information System

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Maori Land Information System

• Dr Colin Boswell
• IT ConsultantMinistry of Justice
• Govis Conference, Wellington 2003

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MLIS and the Maori Land Court

• The Maori Land Court
• The Maori Land Information System
• History
• Functions
• Current status
• Architecture
• Delivery
• Issues
• Future directions

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Role of MLC

• The Maori Land Court provides
• a disputes resolution process for land owners
• a historical registry recording land ownership
  details
• information services to land owners about their
  lands, history, and culture
• for Maori land and land owners

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The Maori Land Court

• The Maori Land Court (Te Kooti Whenua Maori) is
  the New Zealand court that hears matters relating
  to Maori Land.
• About 1.3 million hectares in New Zealand is
  designated as Maori freehold land, just under
  five percent of the total 26.4 million hectares
  in the country. (20 of Maori Land owners live in
  Australia)
• MLC has jurisdiction over
• appointment of trustees
• succession orders in respect of interests in
  Maori land
• partition orders under section 289 of the Act
• vesting orders transferring or gifting land or
  interests
• orders creating incorporation of Maori land
  owners
• calling meetings of owners to consider alienation
  and use of Maori land
• confirmation of alienation of Maori land
• appointment of trustees to
• charging orders in respect of rates owing
• appointment of agents for various purposes.
• Before MLIS Court records could only be searched
  by going to the original paper records, stored at
  the seven MLC Registry Offices.

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The Maori Land Court Districts
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MLC IT systems

• MLIS is a key Courts system. Without it MLC
  cannot operate.
• MLOL is a restricted, web based, version of MLIS.
  It is operational but not in service, waiting on
  approval by stakeholders
• MLC web site gives stakeholders the opportunity
  to submit requests to MLC.
• A link between MLC and the LINZ LOL Maori land
  information is used by MLC staff in their day to
  day work.

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MLIS

• Automates many of the MLC functions
• Has reduced operational costs of the MLC
• Aims to eliminate dependence on paper records
• Automates many of the administrative functions
• Provides workflow management
• Enables performance management
• Provides a single, country-wide repository of
  accurate records
• Enables the production of ad hoc reports
• Is the only database of its kind for indigenous
  people

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MLIS and the MLC

• Functions
• MLIS processes and provides access to national
  Maori Land Court records through all the Maori
  Land Court offices through out New Zealand.
• All Maori Land Court legal documents are
  generated using MLIS and are automatically stored
  on the system as images.
• All earlier paper records have been scanned and
  are being progressively loaded and stored in the
  system as images
• All these images are retrievable for searching
  and annotation purposes.

• Statistics
• 12,800 ownership details for biggest block
• 28,000 blocks
• 2.8 Million ownership records
• MLIS
• is approximately 3,500 function points - a big
  system
• services 9 regional offices
• Supports 295 users

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History of MLIS

• National Index developed 1997
• Workflow developed 1998
• Imaging developed 1999
• MLIS progressively released 1998/9
• Imaging went live 2000Backscanning commenced
• Phase 4 backscanning pilot complete August 2003
• Backscanning completion planned June 2004

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Components of MLIS

• National Index
• Workflow
• Imaging
• Report production
• Query handling
• Management reporting
• Panui production (schedule of hearings)
• Information to the public

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Current status of MLIS

• Stable and reliable system
• up to 10 minor help desk calls per week, no major
  calls
• 160 outstanding change requests (vs. over 250 a
  year ago)
• 10-20 high priority requests, no major new change
  requests
• most changes are technical and performance
  related
• Running since 1999 with no loss of service
• MLC cannot now function without MLIS

MLIS, along with Collect and CMS, is one of the
key operational systems within the Ministry of
Justice
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Architecture

• Two tier PowerBuilder/Oracle system
• Central image store (HP magneto-optical jukebox)
• Local images stored in regional servers
• Images from other servers can be downloaded and
  cached as required
• Local print and file servers
• Local scanners
• Remote DR system
• Separate development and test servers

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Key elements of MLIS

• National IndexSupports the capture, maintenance
  and searching of Maori land titles, owners and
  ownership details.
• WorkflowManages entering items of work into the
  system and their processing to completion.Include
  s Court scheduling and Panui compilation.
• ImagingElectronically records and stores images
  of paper documents, including historical Records
  of the Maori Land Court to enable retrieval and
  reference.

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Minute Book image (05/02/1881) in magnified
mode
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Minute Book image (20/09/2000) created in
Word
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Block Search screen
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Block Ownership screen
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MLIS is a success

• Running since 1999 with no loss of service
• Staff reductions of 25 in MLC offices
• Significant time savings
• Users see no big issues outstanding
• MLC cannot now function without MLIS

MLIS, Collect and CMS are the key operational
systems within the Ministry of Justice
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Benefits

• National access to all Maori land information
• users not restricted to local data only
• Increased speed to process, undertake
  transactions and search
• 25 reduction in MLC staffing
• Direct access by public, including access to
  other districts
• Stakeholders get computer printouts of land
  blocks within days, not months
• Court records are now as current as the date of
  entry and are available across the whole country

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Benefits (cont.)

• Faster processing for clients
• Powerful tool for monitoring organisational
  performance - providing management information
  that enables better planning by MLC
• Panui production
• Faster what took each of the seven courts 5days
  data entry and 2 days checking now takes 2
  minutes to produce and lt ½ day to check
• Ability to check to see that applications are
  included in Panui within target times
• What was an error prone operation now error free

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Benefits (cont.)

• Statistical performance data available to
  Management and Minister
• Case managers can complete their tasks without
  having to leave desks to access paper records
• Enhanced document security - fire, theft, damage,
  handling
• Centralised information and record storage
• Ability to produce staff performance measures
• Manual part 4 search took took between 20 and 40
  weeks because of the need for each district to do
  the search - now can be done in two hours max
• Before MLIS, a Current Owners report was not
  possible, now takes less than one minute

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MLIS is an economical system
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MLIS is central to MLC
BUT

• Obsolescent software (Jukebox, Oracle,
  Powerbuilder)
• Old and fully depreciated hardware (Jukebox,
  servers)
• Orphan development software (PowerBuilder)
• Documentation needs attention
• System knowledge is staff dependent

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Future

• Remote access to service off site MLC hearings
• Integration with other Judiciary systems
  (Judicial Decisions database in particular)
• Other MLC roles, Maoris Fisheries Allocations in
  particular
• Enhanced ad hoc reporting
• MLOL on line
• GIS

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Summary

• The Maori Land Court
• The Maori Land Information System
• History
• Functions
• Current status
• Architecture
• Delivery
• Issues
• Future directions

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• Any questions?