Bureau of Justice Statistics: FY 2015 National Criminal History Improvement Program (NCHIP)

The goal of the NCHIP grant program is to improve the nation’s safety and security by enhancing the quality, completeness, and accessibility of criminal history record information and by ensuring the nationwide implementation of criminal justice and noncriminal justice background check systems. Achieving this goal is contingent on accomplishing four objectives:

• providing direct financial and technical assistance to states and tribes to improve their criminal records systems and other related systems in an effort to support background checks;

• ensuring the infrastructure is developed to connect criminal history records systems to the state record repository or appropriate federal agency record system and ensuring records are accessible through the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) records systems;

• providing the training and technical assistance needed to ensure that records systems are developed and managed to conform to FBI standards, and appropriate technologies, while ensuring that contributing agencies adhere to the highest standards of practice with respect to privacy and confidentiality; and

• using systematic evaluation and standardized performance measurement and statistics to assess progress made in improving national records holdings and background check systems.

The NCHIP program serves as an umbrella for various record improvement activities and funding streams, each of which has unique goals and objectives. As a basic principle of this program, BJS strongly encourages states and tribes to ensure the integrated functioning of record improvement initiatives, regardless of the funding source. Also, BJS strongly encourages applicants to match or leverage the federal funds provided with other resources to the maximum extent possible.