As a network of state and local justice information sharing practitioners, JISPnet is interested in best practices, standards, and resources for solving the issues of information sharing within criminal and juvenile justice at local, state, and national levels.

JISPnet exists today as a group of committed justice information systems practitioners from various projects and jurisdictions across the nation who work together to help facilitate communication and assistance among project and program managers.

The area of information systems integration in criminal justice has grown exponentially in the past 5 - 10 years. Scores of professional criminal justice organizations within the justice community have begun to address the issues of interoperability and information sharing, and a number of organizations and agencies (funded by the federal government) have become expressly devoted to studying this issue and providing information or technical assistance in the area of information sharing and integration. However, this list is almost too numerous, and most of these efforts lack clarity across the enterprise (i.e. many are devoted either to a single aspect of the "integration problem" where others are concerned only with the perspective of single line-of-business, e.g. law enforcement, corrections, etc.).

The JISPnet Board of Directors is comprised of ten experienced and reputed project/program leaders from various local and state criminal justice information sharing initiatives in the United States. Together, they have begun to shape a forum for centralizing and standardizing issues and solutions for integrating justice information systems by embracing an enterprise-wide and national view.

Blending the information, experience, and resources across many sources, many agencies and diverse backgrounds, the JISPnet effort attempts to communicate a more pragmatic and holistic approach to criminal justice information sharing. Further, where many resources today exist through government funding, the value and effectiveness of each of these resources varies, and local integrators are often at a loss to determine what is useful and practical in terms of their own needs. JISPnet seeks NOT to compete with these many groups and efforts, but instead to remain independent, reviewing and recommending the "best of breed" in the available resources, and providing neutral and objective input into these public and private initiatives to promote coordinated, value, and result-driven outcomes.

In the past year, JISPnet has brought together over 1020 members from across the United States and from other nations' criminal justice communities to share ideas, concepts, standards, experiences, and resources within its peer network.