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The 3rd edition transition took place between April, 1994 and October 1996. This was a major transition involving the transference of 897 standards into a manual of 436 standards. In recognition of the significant work involved in making this transition, CALEA assessors were instructed to conduct the first 3rd edition on-site assessment for all reaccreditation agencies as though it were an initial accreditation. The focus was taken off performance in time sensitive areas over the previous 5 years and placed once again on agency systems. Assessment teams were required to report how effective those systems might be for continued compliance with 3rd edition standards. Coincidental with the 3rd edition transition, CALEA reduced the accreditation award cycle to 3 years and eliminated the requirement that agencies achieve 5% increments in compliance with other-than-mandatory standards. The built-in "grace period" for time-sensitive standards in the 3rd edition conversion was, by design, to make this conversion smoother for all agencies. Agencies preparing for reaccreditation on-site assessments were not required to include the previously verified ISSR in their files. 4th Edition Transition: Some agencies have mistakenly understood the conversion from 3rd to 4th edition to mean they will have the same "grace period" that existed with the 2nd to 3rd edition conversion. First, there is significantly less work involved in converting to the 4th edition. Secondly, the time-sensitive areas remain relatively intact (the few areas that were changed actually expanded the time limits). This means that any agency previously having a 3rd edition on-site will be required to have the previously verified ISSR placed as the bottom document in each file. The compliance file should start with the standard statement, followed by the current ISSR, a representative sampling of proofs for that file, and the 3rd edition ISSR.
Time Sensitive Accreditation Files: Placing the appropriate amount of "proofs" in each file for a time sensitive standard can sometimes be a judgment call, so accreditation managers should be kept abreast of where historical files are located and where additional proofs might be located, if needed. The outside objective assessor should be able to make a quick determination that the proofs are representative of a system that is working effectively, and that adding more proofs would only be redundant or make the file unwieldy. Most agencies get their best advice in this area from mock assessors, but occasionally an agency will be asked for additional proofs in a file where mock assessors previously indicated it could be pared-down. Therefore, the accreditation manager should save any such materials until after the CALEA on-site assessment, rather than destroying these documents. Remember that a slight variance in opinions here is a natural outcome of having several persons review these files. 20% Category: While there is no longer a required incremental increase in the amount of other-than-mandatory standards for which an agency must comply, all agencies are encouraged to comply with as many as possible. The accreditation manager should prepare proofs for as many standards in this category as possible, keeping in mind that you can opt out at any time, as long as the 20% level is not exceeded. Opting out can be the best approach during an on-site assessment, since this will save time and not result in a negative in the assessment team report.
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