tyler tech

Welcome to "LIVE at Connect '23 (Part 2)", a special edition of the Tyler Tech Podcast. Join us as we take you behind the scenes of Tyler Connect, Tyler's annual user conference that brings together government and technology leaders from all corners of the country. In this Part 2, we delve deeper into the heart of the conference, sharing the excitement and inspiration that filled the air.

In Part 2, we talk to three Tyler Excellence award winners about what they did to receive the award, and what life was like before implementing their solutions.  

We also talk to an industry expert in the school transportation space, and find out the important issues and trends facing the school transportation industry. 

Guests on LIVE at Connect '23 Part 2:

Pamela Clark is the Business Systems Specialist for the town of Prosper, Texas. We talk to Pamela about her Tyler Excellence Award and how they went from a manual, paper system to an always on, 24/7 solution that reduced revision time by 50%. 

Cindy Burke is the Senior Director Data Science at San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG). Find out how they set a high level of excellence for their data and how they make it accessible to people, including visualizations.  

Liang Tian, Ph.D is Principle, Data Science at SANDAG.  Hear him discuss the importance of creating dashboards that make data and information easily accessible and digestible for San Diego residents.  

Tony Corpin is the Publisher of School Transportation News.  He talks about the school transportation industry and the important issues leaders in the space are addressing.  What are the current conversations happening in the school transportation space?

Learn more about Tyler Technologies

Discover more great content from Tyler Technologies

Why are payments important to government?  And what are the challenges government faces when trying to create payment options to fit their constituent's needs?  

We dive into this topic with payments expert Sloane Wright in Part 2 of our three part series.  Sloane is an experienced executive working with federal, state and local governments to deliver award winning technology and payment solutions for almost two decades with Tyler. He has led State division operations in the states of Alabama, Indiana and Florida and has been responsible for using innovation and technology to make all government agencies, including departments of transportation and motor vehicles, more accessible, secure and convenient for businesses and citizens.

You'll learn more about the risks governments face if they are not able to react to the changing expectations citizens have regarding payments, and what solutions exist to help address the problem. 

Learn more about Payments 

Learn more about Tyler Technologies

With new states passing cannabis laws, regulations become more important and new cannabis programs must be considered. To help us understand all the nuances related to this issue, Alex Valvasorri, Tyler Technologies General Manager for Licensing is joined by Erik Gundersen.  

Erik Gundersen is the Founder and Principal of ERG Strategies, LLC. ERG Strategies is a consulting firm, driven by the experience of a former top cannabis regulator, that provides unique insights and perspective to cannabis regulators and businesses to help them achieve their goals.

Prior to launching ERG Strategies, Erik served as Executive Director of Maine’s Office of Cannabis Policy (OCP). In February 2019, Maine Governor Janet Mills tapped Gundersen to establish the OCP and launch the state’s adult use cannabis program. Under Gundersen’s leadership, the OCP successfully ushered in the first set of program rules, scaled the Office, and began accepting license applications at the end of 2019. Maine’s adult use cannabis program launched in 2020 amid the COVID pandemic.

Additionally, Erik was a founding member of CANNRA, the national association of cannabis regulators.

Learn more about Tyler Technologies

We had a great conversation about Matt's role(s) at Tyler Technologies. He is a Software Engineering team Manager and the director of the Maine App Challenge. Educate Maine and Project>Login have partnered with Tyler on the Maine App Challenge since 2015. 

"Study hard, learn and prosper!" ~Matt Jones' Dad

https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-jones-cste-uxc-78793957/

http://maineappchallenge.com/

https://www.tylertech.com/careers

Why are payments important to citizens?  And what are the challenges citizens face?  We dive into this topic with payments expert Sloane Wright.  Sloane is an experienced executive working with federal, state and local governments to deliver award winning technology and payment solutions for almost two decades with Tyler. He has led State division operations in the states of Alabama, Indiana and Florida and has been responsible for using innovation and technology to make all government agencies, including departments of transportation and motor vehicles, more accessible, secure and convenient for businesses and citizens.

You'll learn more about the risks governments face if they are not able to react to the changing expectations citizens have regarding payments, and what solutions exist to help address the problem. 

Learn more about Payments 

Learn more about Tyler Technologies

The global pandemic has impacted many healthcare-related issues.  What has been the impact on the opioid epidemic and what do governments need to know?  Guest host and Managing Director of Health Ventures at Tyler Technologies, Jeff Stocker is joined by three distinguished guests to address this question: Rob Valuck, PhD and CEO of RxAssurance, Gary Wayne Clark, Chief Strategy Officer of RxAssurance, and Christie Frick, Director of Prescription Drug Monitoring. You'll find out if it's still a crisis, which stakeholders need to be involved, and what tools and technology exist that can help address this problem. 

Learn more about Tyler Technologies 

K9 units add much value to police departments.  From bomb detection to identifying electronic parts, these dogs are versatile and quite amazing.  But how the dogs get identified and placed with departments, and what training is involved?  We answer these questions and more in our conversation with Cheryl Walsh, whose foundation "Sean's K9s" focuses on these very issues.  Find out the history of Sean's K9s and what they do to help K9 units across the country. 

Learn more about Sean's K9s 

Learn more about Tyler Technologies Public Safety solutions 

What happens when medical cannabis is approved and a state must quickly move to implement regulations?  Where that’s exactly where Kris Adcock, the Director of the Mississippi medical cannabis program, found herself.  

Kris is with the Mississippi State Department of Health and is an accomplished administrator and proven leader within multiple Mississippi state government systems.  She leveraged her twenty plus years of experience in child welfare and health care administration to help figure this problem out.

You will enjoy this episode as, Alex Valvassori, Tyler’s General Manager for Cannabis Licensing, speaks with Kris to find out exactly what steps she took to address this challenge.  

More about Tyler Technologies 

More about Mississippi Medical Cannabis Program

Have you received a jury summons in the mail and suddenly your shoulders drop?  Your friends say “well, I hope you don’t get selected”.  Trial by jury is an important part of our society but the experience can often be one we try to avoid.

In Episode 53 of the Tyler Tech Podcast, we talk with Scott Kerr and discuss how local government can improve this experience.  Scott is the General Manager of Tyler Technologies’ Jury Solutions business unit. The business specializes in developing software products and services that help courts streamline and improve the jury process. Over a 30-year career, Scott and his team have built and implemented jury management systems all over the world.

Learn more about Tyler Jury Service and Management

Learn more about Tyler Technologies

Back on episode 40 of the Tyler Tech podcast, Alex Valvassori, the General Manager for Cannabis Licensing at Tyler Technologies hosted an episode looking into how Missouri handled medical marijuana licensing.

Alex is back today to speak with Andrew Brisbo and Gillian Schauer of the Cannabis Regulators Association (or CANNRA) about the quickly-rising and important topic of Cannabis regulation.  

Andrew was appointed by Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer to lead Michigan’s Cannabis Regulatory Agency (CRA) in April 2019. The CRA oversees the medical and adult-use marijuana industries, regulates hemp-derived products, and runs the state’s medical marijuana registry card program.  Andrew is also active in the Cannabis Regulators Association (CANNRA), a national organization of more than 40 US state and territorial regulatory agencies that provides policy makers and regulatory agencies with the resources to make informed decisions when considering how to approach the legalization and regulation of cannabis. He currently serves as CANNRA’s president, having been elected to the role in 2021.

Gillian Schauer is the Executive Director of CANNRA, Dr. Schauer has worked in public health and drug policy for nearly two decades and has a decade of experience working with federal and state agencies on cannabis policy, data monitoring, and research translation. Dr. Schauer is also an affiliate Research Scientist with the Addictions, Drug & Alcohol Institute at the University of Washington. She has more than 70 peer-reviewed research publications on cannabis, tobacco, and other substances. She has a PhD in Behavioral Science from Emory University, a Master of Public Health from University of Washington, and a Bachelor of Science from Northwestern University.

In this episode, you'll learn why CANNRA was formed, what work they do, and why it is important as the need for cannabis regulation rises. 

Learn more about Tyler Technologies

Learn more about CANNRA

"Cloud" gets thrown around as something we are moving towards, but you may be surprised how prevalent it has become in everyday life.  Russell Gainford, VP of Cloud Strategy and Operations at Tyler Technologies, joins host Jeff Harrell to discuss cloud adoption and the many ways the cloud benefits people both personally and professionally. Russell also shares how public sector leaders can make the most of the opportunities the cloud brings their jurisdictions.

Learn more about Tyler Technologies

Learn more about Tyler Cybersecurity

As we move deeper into 2022, we want to share the key themes in the public sector we'll be talking about.  From our Tyler Tech Resource Center on Tylertech.com, to our Tyler Tech Podcast, these are themes impacting the public sector.  To uncover these, the Tyler Tech Editorial Manager, Meredith Trimble, joins the podcast.  She reveals each one, and goes into depth with relevant examples to illustrate why these are so important today.  

Find out more about Tyler Technologies

Check out the Tyler Tech Resource Center

Now that we have reached the end of 2021 and year one and a half of this podcast, we give you highlights from some of the best podcast episodes of 2021.  

The first is Episode 23 entitled 5 Key Public Sector Themes for 2021
In this episode, Meredith Trimble, Tyler Technologies’ editorial content manager, discusses how Tyler’s clients innovated in each of these five areas in scalable ways, even during the most challenging circumstances.  She Finds inspirationin the stories illustrating the year’s top public sector themes.  Here’s a little taste from Episode 23.

The next is Episode 25, called 5 Reasons to Use American Rescue Plan Funds to Support Data Infrastructure
with Tyler Kleykamp, director of the State Data Officers Network and fellow at Georgetown’s Beeck Center for Social Impact + Innovation, Tyler joined the podcast to discuss specific reasons why governments should use federal relief funds now to support data infrastructure. 

Now up is Mark Funkhouser.  Mark joined Jeff to talk about 5 Ways to Not Waste Stimulus Funds With Mark Funkhouser on Episode 26. Funkhouser’s key tips included investing in projects that may have significant upfront cost but will reduce future operating expenses, thinking beyond jurisdictional borders to pool resources for larger impact, and investing in cybersecurity to decrease risk.

Next we switch to school transportation and Episode 34.  Tyler Technologies’ Kim Rentner, who is a thought leader in the school transportation space, interview Dr. Linda Bluth in an episode entitled, Transporting Students With Special Needs
Dr. Linda Bluth is with the Maryland State Department of Education, Division of Special Education/Early Intervention Services, and past-president, National Association for Pupil Transportation. Dr. Bluth details for listeners how alternative modes of transportation are important as districts consider the needs of students, parents, drivers, and communities at large and provides expert tips on how to articulate the benefits of alternative modes of transportation to stakeholders including parents.  

Next up is Episode 35 which focuses on Connecticut’s Data-Driven Approach to Back to School.  Tyler Tech podcast guest host Beth Amann interviews Pauline Zaldonis, a key member of the Connecticut Open Data team, to discuss data-driven work in the state of Connecticut. Zaldonis covers the basics of her state’s Open Data Portal as well as the success of cross-agency partnerships continuing to empower residents with the important public health information they need. 

Our final highlight in the Best of is Episode 36 which focuses on the  Benefits of the Cloud in the Public Sector Why is everyone talking about the cloud? The coronavirus pandemic accelerated new technology adoption as well as moves to the cloud for many public sector agencies, and even Tyler itself, which accelerated cloud development for some of its products. In this episode, Russell Gainford, Tyler’s vice president, cloud strategy & operations, provides an insider look at Tyler’s own cloud journey as well as specific reasons why public sector leaders should care about the cloud and how they can ensure their jurisdiction’s security, agility, and sustainability through cloud-enabled solutions.

Find out more about Tyler Technology

How do you pull off an event that helps your clients maximize the value and efficiency of their solutions when you’ve got thousands of users using many different solutions in many different areas of government?

Well Tyler Connect is the Tyler Technolgoes user conference and we are going to get a sneak peek behind the scenes of this outstanding event because our guest today is Julia Manheim.  Julia is the Manager of Event Experience here at Tyler, and an amazing wealth of insight and information.

You'll enjoy this interesting peek behind the curtain on how to pull off an event totally focused on create the best possible experience for clients.  

Pauline Zaldonis, a key member of the Connecticut Open Data team, joins guest host Beth Amann to discuss data-driven work in the state of Connecticut. 

We cover the basics of the Connecticut Open Data Portal and the success of cross-agency partnerships in the state to empower residents with the information they need. The School Learning Model Indicators Dashboard and data surrounding COVID-19 have increased attention on the Open Data Portal, and Pauline shares how the team is thinking about resident engagement– especially as we head back to school for the 2021-2022 school year. 

Learn more about the open data portal:

CT Open Data Portal

CT COVID-19 Story

Nominate a Dataset

School Learning Model Indicators

Tyler Technologies

Social media is a very important communication tool for government.  In fact, in the study Tyler Technologies did with the Center for Generational Kinetics, over half of both Gen Z and Millenials said they prefer to get their information from local government via social media.

Heather Daniels, Tyler Technologies' sr. social media specialist is back to help us understand the top 5 mistakes to avoid when using social media.  Heather was with us on Episode 21 discussing 5 tips for improving social media, and now she helps us navigate those things to avoid.

Heather spent several years in the public sector with cities like Los Angeles and Missouri City, Texas, and shares her insight with us.

Here's the 5 Mistakes Heather shares:

1. Not targeting a specific audience - being too broad
2. Cross posting the same post on all platforms
3. Not commenting to posts in a timely manner
4. Posting too often, or not enough
5. Repeatedly using the same style of image
6. BONUS: Using poor spelling and grammar

Find out more about Tyler Technologies

With the American Rescue Plan Act, local government is seeing opportunities to address some of the challenges they are facing brought on by the pandemic.  But what’s the best way to use these funds?  How do you make sure to best leverage this unique opportunity with both short term needs and long term priorities in mind?   Well, to help us understand this, we turn to Mark Funkhouser.

Mark Funkhouser, is the president of Funkhouser & Associates, and is a municipal finance expert and former mayor of Kansas City who has served as a government official, elected leader and publisher of Governingmagazine. He is a trusted and credible advisor to government officials who is uniquely qualified to help them put their communities on the path to fiscal sustainability. 

Mark has a master’s degree in social work from West Virginia University, an M.B.A. from Tennessee State University, and an interdisciplinary Ph.D. in public administration and urban sociology from the University of Missouri at Kansas City.

Ways to Not Waste Your Stimulus Funds

1. Don’t misapply a temporary windfall
2. Invest some of the money to reduce your operating costs
3. Think beyond your borders
4. Make overdue investments in technology and cybersecurity
5. Spend some on social services and small businesses to avert short-term disaster

It often dominates the headlines.  Modern criminals, cyber and otherwise, are using modern ways to conduct crime. So here’s the problem we are looking at in this episode:  if modern criminals are more sophisticated than ever, how can federal law enforcement use technology to keep us safe?

Well, to help us answer that question, we turn to Skip Bland, a development executive, with Tyler Technologies.  Skip has an incredible background, including:

• More than 30 years of military security, law enforcement, and counterintelligence experience. 
• Upon joining the U.S. Air Force in 1984, he guarded nuclear weapons storage areas and aircraft at strategic commands near Oxford, England, and later in Adana, Turkey. 
• From there he spent a decade with the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI), which identifies, investigates, and neutralizes serious criminal, terrorist, and espionage threats to the USAF and Department of Defense, thereby protecting national security.

Skip is a wealth of information and helps us carefully navigate this very important topic.  

Here's the 7 Ways Criminal Investigations Benefit from Innovative Technology:

1. To fight modern crime, you need modernized investigative solutions
2. Integrated solutions support collaboration across the investigative landscape
3. Internal tracking of investigative activity leads to better outcomes
4. Law enforcement reporting and analytics lead to better insights 
5. Informant tracking solutions streamline informant interactions
6. Tracking LE officials’ training and behavior enables accountability
7. Mobile case management empowers the field operator

Vocational Rehabilitation.  It’s a vital service for individuals and communities, but to be effective, VR counselors must have the right tools to help.

To help us understand what vocational rehabilitation is, who is eligible, and what success looks like for both the individual and community, we turn to John Harper.  John is the Chief Subject Matter Expert at Encorpe, and has 25 years working in vocational rehabilitation.

He has a Master’s degree in vocational rehabilitation counseling, a licensed professional counselor, a certified rehabilitation counselor, and spent many years in the Missouri Vocational Rehabilitation agency.

Learn more about Tyler Technologies Vocation Rehabilitation Solutions

In this episode, we meet Carli Carter - a software engineer at Tyler Technologies, based in Yarmouth, ME.  Carli is from the Ellsworth, Maine area.

Carli interned at Tyler Technologies first and then was hired into a full-time role after graduating from Thomas College. Carli shares her education pathway and what it's like to work at Tyler. She also talks about the JA Challenge and her involvement with Junior Achievement and giving back.

To learn more about internships and jobs at Tyler Tech visit their careers page: https://www.tylertech.com/careers