Technology Department reports big savings

 

By David Wallace

C & G Staff Writer

            Clinton Township got good news April 5 from its Information Technology Department, which is realizing a considerable savings and getting back on schedule after the township fired its IT director last year.

            The department made its first regular report since last September, when then-IT Director Sandi Petik revised the township’s information technology plan to cost about $7.2 million from a previous plan of $4.8 million, which consulting firm Plante & Moran designed. That meeting came into question, and the board fired the IT director in November.

            “Since the last time we were here, the Technology Department has essentially been retooled,” said Acting IT Director Brian Moynihan.

            The Information Technology Department is implementing the township’s technology plan, which intends to modernize its computer and communications networks.

            Back in September, considerable attention focused on the township’s wiring needs to implement the plan.

            “In our reevaluation and our retooling, we gave the highest priority to looking at the wiring in the township center. That was going to be the biggest cost that was staring us in the face,” said Moynihan.

            “I’m glad to tell you that the wiring for the Civic Center and the (Senior Center) is complete. We have finished wiring up with the latest, greatest, you might say, network cabling,” said Moynihan. “We’ve also connected the two buildings with a fiber optic link, so essentially this whole plaza is now networked together.”

            The cost at the time of the board meeting was about $18,700 for the wiring.

            “We expect to not rise above $22,000 as it stands right now,” said Moynihan. “For comparison purposes, seven months ago you were told that the wiring of what we’ve done would have cost $1.055 million. The original plan that Plante & Moran gave us said it would cost $150,000, and as we mentioned, $22,000 looks to be our capstone.

            “Now you’re probably thinking, as I would be, wow, if somebody does something that’s that much cheaper than anticipated, did we buy junk?” said Moynihan.

            For the technologically inclined, the township has EIA/TIA 568B certified copper wiring.

            “It’s certified cabling for running not only our current speeds, which are about 10/100 megabits to the desktop, but potentially in the future, gigabit to the desktop with a high-speed backbone,” said Moynihan.

            Department of Public Works employees put in 150 hours of work that reduced labor costs for the project. Moynihan and network analyst Jim Lewis are certified network technicians and they did the testing and design themselves.

            “We just did everything that costs money ourselves,” Moynihan said.

            The IT Department also looked at the licensing for its servers.

            “Licensing software in general costs money, far more than hardware these days, and Microsoft probably all the more so. So we tried to find the most efficient way, the most inexpensive way that we could license the servers and desktops that we need. So what we did is we entered into a select agreement with Microsoft. Microsoft enables select agreements with clientele — corporate and municipal clientele — and allows us to buy at a reduced price structure,” Moynihan explained.

            The township piggybacked on the state’s contract with Microsoft and got the best pricing Microsoft offers with its select agreements, he said.

            Other work freed up phone lines and eliminated 27 dial-up accounts used for e-mail and Internet. Many other projects are completed or in the works.

            Moynihan said the township got behind schedule on its technology plan by perhaps 18 months.

            “That 18 months behind represented 24 separate projects that hadn’t even been touched. Seven of those are now finished. Ten of them are nearly finished. Within the last three-to-five months, in other words, 30 percent of that gap has been closed,” said Moynihan.

            The costs to implement the technology plan look better than first thought.

            “If everything else today was done at the cost from the plan as presented in September of last year, we would still be back down to $5.6 million. And my expectation is that not only will we beat that number, but we will very likely beat the $4.8 million that was originally projected,” said Moynihan.

            Members of the Township Board praised Moynihan and his staff.

            “He has saved a lot of money for the township and he’s providing quality service at the same time,” said Clinton Township Supervisor Robert Cannon.

            The Township Board also gave the go-ahead to post the position of IT Director for current township employees.

            You can reach David Wallace at dwallace@candgnews.com