Title
District Attorney’s Office recommending the Board:
1) Authorize the Purchasing Agent to issue Purchase Contract 10114 with Peregrine Technologies Inc. for a perpetual agreement with an initial period of three-years and twenty-eight days with an amount not to exceed $651,000 for the initial term;
2) Approve and authorize the Purchasing Agent to execute Peregrine Customer Order Form & Scope of Services as incorporated within Purchase Contract 10114;
3) Authorize the Purchasing Agent to execute any future amendments to Purchase Contract 10114 that do not alter the amount nor the term, contingent upon approval by County Counsel and Risk Management;
4) Approve and authorize the District Attorney to allocate discretionary Supplemental Local Law Enforcement Funds to support expenses related to the execution of Purchase Contract 10114 with Peregrine Technologies Inc,; and
5) Approve and authorize the Chair to sign Fiscal Year 2025-26 budget transfer increasing revenue and appropriations within the District Attorney’s budget by $195,000 (4/5 vote required).
FUNDING: Supplemental Local Law Enforcement Funds.
Body
DISCUSSION / BACKGROUND
The District Attorney’s Office (DA) investigative and prosecutorial teams spend significant time locating, validating, and synthesizing information across multiple independent systems, which requires ongoing manual reconciliation and cross-checking by staff. The DA identified persistent operational challenges related to fragmented data across multiple systems, resulting in inefficiencies, duplicative work, and limited cross-agency visibility. The DA explored approaches to improve situational awareness, investigative support, and data integrity while preserving existing systems and governance structures. Peregrine Technologies Inc. (Peregrine) was identified through discussions with peer counties and evaluation of justice-focused data platforms as a solution capable of addressing these challenges without requiring a full system replacement or extensive custom County-built integration efforts.
County Procurement Policy Section 3.5 describes exemptions to the competitive bidding process. Purchase Contract 10114 falls under Exemption “Software (proprietary),” Findings of Fact “Proprietary software is software that is licensed, copyrighted, or patented that only one vendor provides.” Peregrine was selected because it is uniquely designed for local criminal justice environments and already supports the systems, workflows, and security requirements specific to El Dorado County District Attorney’s Office, El Dorado County Sheriff's Office, El Dorado County Probation, El Dorado County District Court, South Lake Tahoe Police Department, and Placerville Police Department. Some key unique attributes include: Pre-built connectors to the County’s existing justice platforms, eliminating the need for costly custom development; patented data deduplication and entity resolution, providing a defensible “single view” of people and cases; integrated search, mapping, link analysis, and reporting within a single platform; vendor-agnostic, open architecture, ensuring County ownership of data and avoiding vendor lock-in; and demonstrated adoption by peer California counties, including Sacramento, Marin, Stanislaus, and Placer Counties. No alternative supplier evaluated offered comparable functionality tailored to local prosecution and justice agencies.
The DA is looking to fund a three-year and twenty-eight day license agreement with Peregrine using Supplemental Local Law Enforcement Funds (SELSF). Per California Government Code sections 30061-30065, SLESF may be utilized by law enforcement agencies for as-needed frontline needs, and the personnel, equipment, and programs that are necessary to meet those needs at the discretion of the District Attorney, per review and approval by the Board of Supervisors. The execution of Purchase Contract 10114 will allow Peregrine to provide their unified data platform for a three-year and twenty-eight day period, in the total amount of $651,000. With Peregrine’s unified data platform in place, the DA would experience seamless integration with critical existing systems the County has in place.
ALTERNATIVES
Should the Board opt not to authorize the Purchasing Agent to execute Purchase Contract 10114, the District Attorney’s Office would continue to experience inefficiencies, duplicate work, and limited cross-agency visibility of data, which would result in delayed investigations and prosecutions. Without Peregrine's unified data platform, the County would need to develop and maintain extensive custom interfaces or replace existing core systems.
PRIOR BOARD ACTION
N/A
OTHER DEPARTMENT / AGENCY INVOLVEMENT
County Counsel
Procurement & Contracts
Auditor Controller’s Office
CAO RECOMMENDATION / COMMENTS
Approve as recommended.
FINANCIAL IMPACT
With the execution of Purchase Contract 10114, there is no change to Net County Cost. The District Attorney’s Office is requesting the use of SLESF to offset the first year’s quoted cost of $195,000. It is anticipated that subsequent annual funding will also be requested from SLESF.
CLERK OF THE BOARD FOLLOW UP ACTIONS
Upon approval, Clerk of the Board to forward executed budget transfer to the Auditor Controller’s Office.
STRATEGIC PLAN COMPONENT
N/A
CONTACT
Vern Pierson, District Attorney