Section 183/4 Secretary of public safety; functions
Section 183/4. It shall be the function of the secretary of public safety:
(1) to develop and implement, in conjunction with the criminal history systems board, an improved system for recording, updating and communicating among criminal justice agencies of the executive office, and the trial court, the attorney general, the Massachusetts sentencing commission, the county sheriffs, and district attorneys, all criminal offender record information and information relevant to sentencing, probation, community corrections, correctional institutions, rehabilitation, and parole decisions in a manner consistent with law and with the rights of all persons who are subjects of such information;
(2) to develop and implement a criminal justice management information system including the organized collection, storage, retrieval, analysis, and dissemination of information among criminal justice agencies of the executive office of public safety, and the trial court, the attorney general, the Massachusetts sentencing commission, the county sheriffs, and the district attorneys of the seven districts;
(3) to develop and implement a criminal justice research and evaluation program including the organized collection, storage, retrieval and analysis of information in order to monitor and provide oversight of criminal justice agencies of the executive office, and trial court, the attorney general, the Massachusetts sentencing commission, the county sheriffs, the district attorneys, and the public;
(4) to develop standards for and coordinate training of state and county institutional and other personnel employed by an agency within the executive office of public safety.
(5) to develop and evaluate programs for the economical provision of sufficient state and county correctional resources to maintain public safety, and prevent overcrowding, and to operate criminal justice agencies and facilities safely and efficiently at or below nationally accepted rates of capacity;
(6) to develop improved systems of classification of persons committed to the custody of probation, corrections, county corrections or parole for the purposes of determining supervision treatment and custody needs of such persons, of integrating and coordinating the functions of these agencies, and of balancing the resources and demands of these agencies; and
(7) to develop and evaluate programs designed to reduce the rate of recidivism among persons committed to the custody of state and county correctional institutions, and parole, to better integrate and coordinate the functions of these agencies, and to balance the resources and demands of these agencies.
(8) To develop and implement, no later than July first, nineteen hundred and ninety-seven, a program to compile and annually publish statistics and information concerning the incidence each year of residential structural fires and crimes against property, including, but not limited to, arson. Such statistics shall be compiled on a geographic basis according to postal zip codes. All state and municipal fire and police authorities shall cooperate with the secretary in the collection and recording of such data. The secretary shall annually file a report of such statistics, together with his analysis of any trends discerned from the same, with the clerk of the senate and the clerk of the house of representatives, who shall forward copies to the joint committees on insurance, the judiciary and public safety, the house and senate committees on ways and means, the attorney general and the commissioner of insurance, who shall forward copies to the joint underwriting association, formed pursuant to the provisions of chapter one hundred and seventy-five C, and to the insurance fraud bureau, formed pursuant to the provisions of chapter three hundred and thirty-eight of the acts of nineteen hundred and ninety.
(9) to develop statewide policies and procedures, including a uniform protocol, for state police and municipal police officers to report to the secretary on the identification of and immediate protection, care and custody of minors whose parents or guardians are arrested or placed in custody by police officers. The policies and procedures shall be developed in consultation with the department of children and families, the department of state police, municipal police departments and the Massachusetts Chiefs of Police Association Incorporated. The secretary shall periodically analyze this information and report the analysis to the department of children and families and appropriate state or municipal police departments.