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CONSIDERATION OF A NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF JUSTICE (NIJ) 2018 CAPACITY ENHANCEMENT AND BACKLOG REDUCTION PROGRAM GRANT IN THE AMOUNT OF $245,000 FOR NEW DNA LABORATORY STAFF AND INSTRUMENTATION.
Presented by: Shelly Steadman, PhD., DNA Technical Leader/Manager, Regional Forensic Science Center.
RECOMMENDED ACTION: Approve the application for the grant, and if awarded authorize acceptance of the grant, the establishment of budget authority as provided in the Financial Considerations section of this Request, and implementation of the Staffing Table changes identified in the Personnel Considerations section of this Request.
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The Sedgwick County Regional Forensic Science Center (RFSC) is an independent local government agency which serves all Sedgwick County, Kansas Law Enforcement agencies. The RFSC has 5.0 FTE Biology/DNA Section positions, all of which are currently filled with qualified case-working scientists.
The DNA laboratory is on the brink of a caseload capacity crisis. In 2014, a multidisciplinary task force convened in Kansas to determine the number of untested kits statewide and the study revealed that over half of the untested kits reside in Sedgwick County. The heightened awareness resulted in a dramatic increase in submissions beginning in 2015. In April 2018, the task force issued formal notification recommending that 100% of the kits collected be submitted for testing. The RFSC currently receives only 30% of the kits collected within Sedgwick County, so kit submissions are expected to triple. In addition to the increased number of sexual assault kits requiring testing, violent crime has continued to rise in Sedgwick County; the DNA section issued twice as many reports/notifications in 2017 than were issued in 2016.
To address these caseload challenges, the Center is requesting resources to enhance the sexual assault screening process through the introduction of an automated extraction platform. Specifically, the RFSC se...
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