As our IT team was developing the electronic medical marijuana application tool they started seeing that the code they were writing had potential uses in other parts of the agency.  In other words- that the basics of the Code could be used to electronify some of our other business lines.  We looked for areas that consumed the most manual labor and decided to modify the medical marijuana code to help us turn our EMT and paramedic certifications into an electronic process. Each year, Bureau staff handles (literally) approximately 8,000 applications, requiring staff enter the information into the certification database by hand.

With the new automated system, EMTs may register from their place of employment or the comfort of their own home.  The system should go live sometime in 2012.  By the way- this initiative fits squarely within our Managing Excellence Initiative as it implements several portions of the Strategic Map.