Information Technology

Information Technology Committee September 13, 2022 East GF Conference Room Call Meeting to Order: Bub called the meeting to order at 11:01 A.M. Members Present: Thiede; Floyd; LaBrec; Bub. Members Absent: Knight. Other Attendees: Melissa Lind; Jen Strama; Larry Brandl; Emily w/Star News. Approve Minutes: Thiede moved to approve the minutes of the March 24, 2022, meeting. Seconded by LaBrec. All Ayes. Motion Carried. Approve Agenda: Thiede moved to approve the agenda with 9 items; LaBrec seconded. All Ayes. Motion Carried. Network Equipment/Heartland Update: Still waiting on Cisco equipment to ship. First estimated date was spring, now August. Some of the equipment for the courthouse and townships has arrived. WanRack still has some work to do getting the county hub setup. Bub will get an update from Russ Berg and Melissa will get an update from Heartland. Incode/Executime Update: Incode is being used since the cutover. Executime is still in the process of being setup for Taylor County. Currently we have 168 pay codes due to contracts and continue to r un into issues with rules and priorities contradicting each other. Bub directed Melissa to contact other counties and see what their pay codes look like for law enforcement. Human Resources will need some training on the Personnel/HR side of the system. 2023 Budget - Approval: The IT budget is going down by $25,000 overall due to us changing to Zoom phones. Print management and computer replacement numbers are staying the same. Thiede made a motion to approve the 2023 budget; LaBrec seconded. All Ayes. Motion Carried. Zoom Phone - Update: The Courthouse, HWY, COA, and Human Services have now all been moved off TDS Managed IP to Zoom phones. Fax lines through TDS remain the same. With the switch to Zoom phones it will save $35,000 per year. Since removing the TDS switches from our network, users are no longer experiencing any network drops and equipment isn’t going down in dispatch. Melissa saved $26,000 by implementing and setting up the Zoom phone system without Zoom Support. The Broadband committee supported the initial purchase of all phones and hardware needed. WanRack Internet - Approval: WanRack gave a proposal for internet services as an ISP for Taylor County. The county could save $42,000 per year once all remote sites are connected and we can eliminate the Spectrum ELAN that is used to connect COA, HWY and HS back to the courthouse. We are under Charter contract until May 2023 and WanRack needs to have things ready on their end. Thiede made a motion to accept WanRack’s proposal as Taylor County’s ISP; LaBrec seconded. All Ayes. Motion Carried. Adjournment: Thiede made a motion to adjourn the meeting at 1 1:56 a.m. Seconded by LaBrec. The next IT Committee Meeting will be scheduled as needed. Information Technology Committee March 24, 2022 East GF Conference Room & Via Zoom Call Meeting to Order: Bub called the meeting to order at 11:02 A.M. Members Present: Thiede; Hansen; Knoll; LaBrec; Bub Members Absent: Other Attendees: Melissa Lind; Jen Strama; Larry Brandl Approve Minutes: Hansen moved to approve the minutes of the August 26, 2021meeting. Seconded by Thiede. All Ayes. Motion Carried. Approve Agenda: Thiede moved to approve the agenda with 9 items; Hansen seconded. All Ayes. Motion Carried. Network Equipment/Heartland Update: All of the equipment has been ordered and will be paid for with Broadband funds. Most of the cables have shipped, waiting on Cisco switches and equipment to ship yet. All of Taylor County’s switches will be replaced. This will allow for TDS phones to be setup using remote office packages. Once all the new equipment is installed and working, Lind will look at prices for new phone systems. Bub reported Bug Tussell will be putting up towers to help the areas fiber won’t be buried. WAN Rack will be monitoring our broadband network. Incode/ExecuTime Update: Everything is moving forward. Admin training is being done again. The last payroll in April will be done with paper timesheets and Execu Time. Jacky will run it both ways to work out any issues that appear. As of now, the plan is to go live with ExecuTime in June. All employees have been accessing the ESS portal. Incode is fully working for AR, AP, reports, budgeting, 1099’s and bank reconciliation. AS400 Replacement: There are currently no lease or maintenance fees being paid. Finance is still using the 400 for historical data. TASO will use their historical data for background checks. ROD still depends on it and are waiting for an engineer to become available to do the conversion for their software. Ongoing Issues: State applications need to move off Internet Explorer and some aren’t compatible with Windows 11. 2022 Outlook: Plans for 2022 are completing the networking/switching upgrades and implementing a new phone system. Health Department is researching software to use for electronic filing. Human Resources will begin using the Personnel portion of Incode soon. Adjournment: Thiede made a motion to adjourn the meeting at 1 1:49 a.m. Seconded by Hansen. The next IT Committee Meeting will be scheduled at a later date.