When it comes to innovation in the legislative process, time-honored traditions are hard to beat. But as the legislative landscape evolves in tandem with advances in legal tech, it’s now possible not only to preserve these processes but enhance them too.
Embracing change takes trust, but the value that technology can bring to the system is already clear to see: it is enabling more efficient, streamlined, and reliable legislative management. So, what are the most important benefits when it comes to adopting new technology in legislative drafting?
Accuracy
Accuracy tops the list of requirements every time. And for good reason. Everyone wants progress, but never at a cost to the integrity of your work – especially when that work involves the law. But increased efficiency doesn’t have to mean more chance of errors – on the contrary, our LWB 360 legislative management solution prioritizes accuracy.
Data accuracy is the cornerstone upon which a reliable, repeatable, and sustainable legislative process is built. Propylon has developed a number of tools to ensure data accuracy and fidelity in all stages of the legislative cycle.
Our compare tool compares the statute sections in a bill with the master statute databases to ensure that all changes to statute are properly marked up, and will detect any changes that haven’t been correctly formatted. Our drafting conflicts tool gives drafters a real-time view of what other legislation is in process that could potentially affect or conflict with the sections that are in the current draft.
Efficiency
We provide drafting attorneys with a tool that simplifies the drafting process. It automatically tracks and reports changes to the legislation, enabling efficient management of the amendment process. The benefits of a more efficient drafting system are outlined by our North Dakota Legislative Council client John Bjornson:
“In designing our drafting system with Propylon, it was important to our drafters that the system reflected our styles, processes, and procedures rather than requiring drafters to adapt to system requirements. Propylon worked hard to learn our business processes and develop a drafting system to meet our business needs and make our processes more efficient. However, while respecting our processes and procedures, Propylon developers also were willing to make suggestions, based upon their experience, for creating efficiency in our processes. The implementation of our drafting system has been effective in streamlining the entire bill drafting process for drafters, proofreaders, and editors. It has moved us toward a paperless process that involves the transitioning of electronic drafts throughout the entire drafting and review process. In addition, it has significantly reduced the amount of staff time involved in the engrossing and enrolling of bills through the automatic generation of amendment instructions from a marked-up version of a bill.”
