FY11 SMART

The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006 (AWA) (Pub. L. 109-248, 42 U.S.C. § 16901, et seq) authorizes the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking (SMART) to administer sex offender management grants. These grants assist state, local and tribal jurisdictions in developing and/or enhancing sex offender registration and notification programs that support substantial implementation of Title I of the AWA, known as the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA). SORNA was enacted to protect the public from convicted sex offenders and offenders against children by establishing a comprehensive national system for the registration of those offenders.

The Division of State Police intends to change the way New Jersey operates with regard to sex offender registration, tiering, and notification by replacing the present manual processes with automation. The Division will migrate the NJ SOR to a web-based system that will support New Jersey's SORNA program. The program objectives are to: 1) enhance public safety and enhance registering jurisdictions efforts by developing a web-based system independent of the mainframe; 2) leverage existing technologies and infrastructure; 3) eliminate manual intervention and processing to the greatest extent possible; and 4) minimize the burden on the registering agency. The present sex offender registration process in New Jersey involves the manual processing of fingerprint cards, and tiering of offenders is presently an individualized process that varies between agencies. The way in which New Jersey will approach SORNA will be dramatically different from the present sex offender registry. The Division's ConOp does not support a phased implementation of NJ SORNA. Performance measures will be based upon successful completion of various aspects of the project.

ca/ncf