JAMAICA ADOPTS AMANDA
Jamaica adopts AMANDA - Software in place to speed up development approvals
The Gleaner Sunday | December 6, 2009
Having already developed a track record to reduce the turnaround
period on delivery of public services in big countries, a workflow
automation system, developed by the Canada-based CSDC Systems Inc, is
being adopted by two parish council bodies here to speed up the
processing of development applications.
After some delay, the
Applications Management and Data Automation (AMANDA) system was
activated on November 30 at the Kingston and St Andrew Corporation and
the Manchester Parish Council, four years after it was first introduced
at the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) in 2005.
US$100,000 software
The introduction of the system was tied to a
mandate to reduce the waiting time for development permit approvals.
The intent was to open the system to all agencies required to sign off
on plan approvals. That typically includes water authorities, road
agencies, the councils, and others, but instead, AMANDA's deployment
has been confined to the local planning authorities in Mandeville and
the capital because of the cost involved.
Others may follow later, however, once resources are identified.
The
software was bought for US$100,000 and has been been used to manage
workflow for environmental permits, environmental licences, beach
licences, air-quality licences, planning applications and subdivision
applications.
The basic system bought has had to be coded by local information-technology engineers to suit specific local needs.
Public
education and community outreach officer with NEPA, George Davis, said
that while entities such as NEPA and parish councils are guided by the
90-day timeline for the approval process, even with the help of the new
software, not all applications are being processed within the
three-month period.
"Some will be done under 90 days and some
beyond the 90-day timeline, depending on the complexity, such as those
which require an environmental impact assessment," he said.
But
he maintained that the system remained an effective workflow-management
tool, which enables the identification and tracking of all steps in the
process.
"It serves as a management tool to track what is
happening with each application and to identify areas in the process
that may be creating a backlog."
Land development
According
to information posted on the website of the developers of the
technology, the AMANDA platform is already in use in Orange County,
Florida, for the automation and streamlining of land-development
reviews, the granting of permits, building-code enforcements and
licensing.
In the state of Ohio, public-health inspection and certification is being made more efficient through the use of the product.
NEPA
is reporting that since the system's Jamaican introduction four years
ago, it has helped to streamline applications for development projects
in every sector of the economy, with more than 8,000 applications
processed since then.
Now that the Government has given a
commitment to reducing the waiting time for project approvals to not
more than 90 days, rolling out the system in the parish councils under
the guidance of NEPA appears targeted to help achieve this undertaking.
The timeline for the roll-out in other parishes has not yet been determined by the Government, according to NEPA officials.
Applications
for environment permits and environment, beach and air-quality licences
are submitted directly to NEPA, while planning and subdivision
applications are submitted to local authorities or parish councils,
which then refer them to NEPA for the advice of the government town
planner or the Town and Country Planning Authority.
The AMANDA
system will now be used to fast-track applications through parish
councils for permits, licences, as well as planning and subdivision
decisions pertaining to housing, manufacturing, the construction of
cellular towers, and specific commercial activities, such as
gas-station operations.
The software also facilitates online tracking of applications.