SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO AM) - The Statewide Automated Victim Information and Notification System will be activated in Minnehaha County at the end of this month.
South Dakota Attorney General Marty Jackley says SAVIN provides crime victims with vital information and notification 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
Jackley says the service allows victims and others to obtain offender information and to register for notification of a change in offender status.
He says access can be made through state's attorney's office, or if the attorney general is prosecuting, the attorney general's office, to gain a designation which enables users access to a significant amount of confidential information.
Jackley says media members and the general public can go the attorney general's website, go into the SAVIN program and enter the information.
He says the information is provided at no additional cost to counties. The system has been financed by in-kind software grants and other grants. He says that's part of the reason that the process has been slow. Jackley says at this point he doesn't see a need to tax counties or have it cost money to counties.
He says SAVIN continues to be upgraded and expanded, becoming automated in more and more counties, which means it's becoming more user friendly. Jackley says as the state continues to work through some of the pilot issues and it is working well.
He says there's always room for improvement but the victims he's talked to like it and hopefully it will become a better system as time goes by.
When SAVIN started it received information from the South Dakota Unified Judicial System, the Department of Corrections and three county jails. Since then, the information feeds have increased to 10 county jails serving a total of 31 counties.
Those jails include: Brookings, Clay, Codington, Davison, Hughes, Lake, Meade, Pennington, Union and Yankton.
(Thanks Jerry Oster, WNAX Yankton)