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Strategic Technology Plan - 2009
Updated April 2009
OVERVIEW
This document provides an executive summary of the current environment, status of previous strategic technology goals and the goals defined for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2009. The County's technology future state vision:
Franklin County local government data center is state-of-the-art, APC Infrastructure in-row cooled that utilizes virtualization for both application servers and desktop clients where feasible. The environment requires minimal desktop support services, allowing the technology staff to focus on enabling County staff to improve their business process efficiencies through the use of technology. The County’s technology infrastructure allows County staff to work anywhere there is an Internet connection in a secure, accessible manner. The County’s technology is secure and redundant to ensure high availability and well-protected citizen data.
The Information Technology team provides the technology required to support local government administration and e-services for the citizens in a cost-efficient manner. The technology infrastructure is resilient and recoverable and able to scale to support the growth of the county, both in terms of internal processing power and services offered.
VIEW OF THE CURRENT ENVIRONMENT (APRIL 2009)
This section of the executive summary is intended to provide a view of the current environment. In this view, the following have been identified and noted: strengths, weaknesses and risks, opportunities for more effective and efficient use of technology, and finally threats that would hamper the success of utilizing technology to ensure effective operation of the County’s governmental processes.
- Technology serves many purposes in an organization, some strategic, some operational and many that are part of doing business in the current state of the world in which we live that we cannot do without. As we plan for how we utilize our natural resources, such as water, we must plan how we utilize and fund technology for strategic initiatives to simply keep governmental process at work. The County realizes that planning and funding of technology is a strategic process that must occur.
- County departments appear ready and willing for changes in the planning, implementation and operation of technology utilized to operate key governmental processes in the County. County administration and several key department heads are eager to utilize technology to better their existing and future governmental processes.
- The County’s technology has matured and many departments are now eager for web portals for communicating and serving the citizens. Several departments are also eager for web applications and support for online credit card payments.
- The County is deploying a web portal and integrated voice recognition component for the commercial land management solution that was implemented in early 2008. This web portal includes support for online payment of fees and charges assessed by the Building or Planning departments. Additional online payment solutions will be deployed beginning in July 2009 for the Parks and Recreation department registrations and reservation processes.
- The remaining legacy applications support the Commissioner of Revenue’s assessment and the Treasurer’s collection processes. Implementation of a commercial tax solution will effectively eliminate the last of the costly and inflexible legacy applications. This implementation would also provide greater integration to County financials and allow extension of tax collection to online services for the citizens. The Commissioner of Revenue has recently moved all real estate functions to the commercial assessment solution and away from the legacy application. The Commissioner and the Treasurer are both ready and willing to move to a commercial software solution for assessment and collection.
- Graphical Information System or GIS continues to be a key service that local government can utilize to enhance public service functions such as community development and public safety. An enterprise solution has been implemented and GIS data is supported by a relational database foundation allowing greater integration to core applications. A strategic implementation plan for GIS deployment throughout County processes is in the final phase.
- The County has a new government center under construction that will include a new data center with a target for early 2010. The move to this new facility will require physically moving the majority of current County technology services to the new data center and providing adequate bandwidth connecting all major facilities. The County’s telecom services will be extended to the new facility. All application services and associated storage will be moved to the new data center.
- The County has virtualized approximately 30% of County servers and continues to consolidate physical servers. The County has implemented a remote application access solution that also serves as the standard virtual private network access method. This solution may also be leveraged to support desktop virtualization for which a business case will be developed to assess the impact on the annual equipment replacement costs over time.
- The County had limited broadband options in this rural environment and many of the remote County government offices had no broadband connection. The Information Technology staff hired a consultant to complete a broadband assessment study in fall of 2005. That study outlined the offerings, providers and rates as well as the geographical areas covered. The Information Technology staff then issued an RFP to locate a wireless Internet service provider to partner with to address the citizen broadband demand as well as connecting all outlying offices. A deployment plan was established and as of spring of 2007, 98% of that plan has been completed. The County is currently working with Ferrum College on a grant driven economic development initiative to expand these broadband services to underserved areas of the County.
A VISION FOR THE FUTURE
This section of the executive summary is intended to provide a vision for the future. In order to move forward versus standing still, it is important to have vision and set goals for the future. In working with departments and County administration, the following sets forth key goals resulting in a vision for the future in terms of utilizing technology to ensure the continued success of the County’s governmental processes.
- Centralized addressing linked to GIS and 911 to provide for a comprehensive land and real property information system. Centralized, consolidated addressing providing residents and businesses with one place to change and maintain their address for all County functions along with the ability to handle changes remotely through the Internet if desired.
- “City Hall Without Walls realized through e-Government” providing an environment where County residents, developers, attorneys, and other key users of County information will have the ability to access real estate, business license, and other information of public record. In addition, have the ability to perform on-line activities such as pay real estate bills, submit a plat for development review, check the status of a zoning review or access many other functions that historically had to be done in person with the convenience of not having to leave their home or place of business.
- Customer focused and ADA/508 compliant internet website that would be easier to navigate, a portal for providing County services online anytime and provide the citizens with easy access to County information. The County's website is an itegral communication link between the citizens and the Franklin County administration and elected officials, providing a mechanism for information distribution as well as obtaining citizen feedback.
- A rural but progressive locality where broadband is widely available to support technological growth and development.
STRATEGY FOR REALIZING THE VISION
This section is intended to set forth the key strategy for aiding the County in realizing the vision set forth along with mitigating the risks and vulnerabilities that could result in interruption of services to County residents and businesses as well as County government as a whole.
An effective strategy moving forward will be a strategy that not only focuses on technology but also focuses on changes in the way in which the County conducts governmental business and processes. It is important to understand the relationship between the governmental processes, the technology utilized to execute the processes and the people that plan, implement and operate the technology. Strategy that follows is broken down into these specific areas. The reason for this is to ensure the County understands that the execution and realization of this strategic plan cannot be the sole responsibility of Information Technology but yet a combined effort between all departments within the County led by the support of the Board of Supervisors.
STRATEGY RELATED TO GOVERNMENTAL BUSINESS PROCESSES
Strategy Recommendation | FY09-10 Funding |
Develop a Strategic GIS Plan and Supporting Technology The GIS plan will identify key uses of GIS within the County, the source of the information, details of the information to be provided and a strategy for making the GIS functions available to County departments, residents or other consumers of GIS functions. | |
STATUS: Franklin County implemented a GIS in 2004 and is finalizing a strategic GIS plan to deploy GIS throughout County departments to realize greater efficiency in land based business processes. In fiscal year FY08-09, the County assessed several key departments to define their needs in terms of GIS and those are included in the strategic plan. The supporting technology has recently been upgraded to ESRI’s ArcGIS Server and all shape-file data is being converted to relational database format. This fiscal year the strategic plan will be finalized and departmental GIS data and application needs will be addressed . In addition, training for departmental GIS specialists will be conducted on the ArcGIS Server solution. The departmental staff members will serve their department and work closely with the County’s GIS team to ensure continuity throughout the GIS. | $0 |
Develop and Fund Technology Operations Plan The County should set forth yearly budgetary appropriations to fund technology infrastructure on a continuing basis. The current equipment lifecycle for computer workstations and servers that hosts the County’s applications is approximately 3-years in terms of industry average. Funding this plan will ensure the County is not faced with a significant “balloon” payment at a date into the future to ensure continued operation of critical technology services. The operations plan should consist of purchased equipment along with equipment leased on terms subject to appropriation. | |
STATUS: The County began an annual equipment replacement plan in FY2003. The I/T department has managed to maintain the plan as the same fixed amount for six years while the number of machines included in that plan has increased 240%. We are now at a point that the replacement costs for all machines coming out of warranty is escalating approximately 50% per year over the next 3 years. In response to these rising costs, in this economy and with a tight budget year, the replacement process will closely evaluate each machine scheduled for replacement and only replace those that are having hardware issues. The I/T team will build the business case for moving to virtualized desktops for all possible office staff and will be increasing available storage to prepare for this technology. | $64,000
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Implement Disaster Recovery Plan The County should identify a strategy to handle resumption of technology utilized to operate key processes including revenue collection and payroll processing in the event a catastrophe such as fire or flood should damage existing computer equipment. | |
STATUS: | $0 |
STRATEGY RELATED TO THE COUNTY'S TECHNOLOGY INFRASTRUCTURE
This section details specific strategy as it related to the infrastructure utilized to operate the key applications including computer servers and communication networks.
Strategy Recommendation | FY09-10 funding |
Email System Upgrade The County’s email system is approximately four years old and needs to be upgraded. This upgrade will provide additional email storage, increased integration with other internal collaboration solutions and enhance communications. | |
STATUS: The County needs to upgrade the email system to the latest software version and replace the associated hardware server. This upgrade will position the County to provide even greater unification of communications between email and telephony. The I/T team will also enhance the SPAM filtering solution to be more redundant and thus reduce a potential point-of-failure in email communications. | $21,000 |
Complete Telephony Conversion at all Remote Offices To reduce monthly telephony expenses, ease maintenance and support and provide for future growth, the traditional PBX was replaced with a state-of-the-art Voice-over-IP solution. The conversion to a VoIP system allows the County to include all departments (including all remote locations) onto one phone system and reduces the dependency on external support of the legacy system and annual maintenance costs. | |
STATUS: The County completed a Voice-over-IP pilot in spring of 2007. Most of the conversion of the telephony solution from the legacy Nortel PBX system to a Cisco VoIP solution was completed in 2008. This fiscal year the I/T team will complete the conversion of remaining, small remote offices – all equipment has already been purchased. | $0 |
Expand Broadband Service Areas throughout the County, Connecting all Outlying Offices to the County Network Support and improve the existing technology infrastructure to provide wider geographical areas with broadband options. Connect all outlying government offices to the County’s network utilizing virtual private networks over public internet or direct fiber connections. | |
STATUS: The County entered into a partnership with a private wireless provider in the fall of 2005. This partnership has resulted in expanding broadband coverage to approximately 70-75% of the County. The County provides infrastructure space to the provider on any County owned tower, water tank or other structure in exchange for services. The County has also completed connecting all remote offices to the County’s network through VPNs. We also connected all of the volunteer fire and rescue stations to our wide area network. The County has actually over-used the provider’s services beyond the equivalent of infrastructure space provided. This year’s funding will be used to pay for those services used and to further assist with expansion of the network to additional areas of the County. | $65,000 |
STRATEGY RELATED TO APPLICATIONS SUPPORTING KEY GOVERNMENTAL PROCESSES
This section details specific strategy as it related to the applications that are utilized by departments within the County for key processes such as assessment, revenue collection and payroll processing.
Strategy Recommendation | Fy09-10 funding |
Implement Comprehensive Local Government Software Package The County should identify requirements for key governmental processes and evaluate and select an off the shelf software package to support key governmental functions within the County. The County will recognize the following key benefits from moving forward with this strategy. · Stable technology that departments and residents can rely on for key functions · Significant increase in overall functionality available to departments within the County · Establish the basis for providing additional services to residents such as Internet access to information. · Remove the reliance and resulting risk related to reliance on a single individual for support of the County’s key applications. · Avoid having to continue to develop on a platform that could potentially not be supported by the software vendor at a point in the future. · Gain significant efficiencies from an integrated platform that shares functionality and information. | |
STATUS: The County has implemented a commercial software solution built specifically for the public sector to support the financial and HR/payroll functions for both the County and the schools. The financial portion of this solution was implemented in July 2005 followed by the Utility Management module for the new water system in August 2005. The new HR/Payroll application was implemented in January 2006. In 2007, we implemented the Employee Self Service portal providing employees access to their information via a secure Internet site. In January 2008, the County went live on a commercial land management solution supporting the Building Inspections and Community Development functions. We are now implementing the Citizen Access Portal to that solution, allowing citizens to conduct services online, including payment of associated fees. This fiscal year, the County is focusing on a commercial solution for tax assessment and collection, which will retire the last of the legacy applications. A strong potential solution has been identified and reviewed by the Commissioner of Revenue and the County Treasurer. We are now working to build the business case and pursue approval of the Board of Supervisors to negotiate the purchase of that solution. | $116,000 |
Develop Internet Web Site to Support e-Government Visionz The County should begin a process to identify key functions that would provide significant benefit to residents and businesses within the County if they were accessible through the public Internet. The County should then develop a web site that can provide these functions to the key users of County government functions. This will allow citizens to see they tax dollars at work servicing their needs. | |
STATUS: The County’s Internet site underwent a complete redesign in 2008 which included moving to a Content Management solution. All departments and agencies have been trained on the new solution and are now able to maintain their information in a far more timely manner. The new site includes greater search capabilities and better organization. This fiscal year the County will begin deploying additional online services including a Citizen Response Management system that will allow citizens to submit questions and concerns online. We also be researching solutions to provide a mechanism for local government leaders to solicit citizen feedback on key issues. | $0 |
Improve Intranet Site for Increased Efficiency The County’s Intranet has grown quickly and become an integral part of internal collaboration. This internal web portal should be easy for departments to update and access and should capitalize on existing technologies to provide as much support for business processes as possible. | |
| STATUS: The County’s site has grown quickly and includes many SharePoint team sites. The County relies on Microsoft’s SharePoint services and needs to upgrade the service to the latest version for tighter integration to Office 2007 products already deployed within the organization. In addition, the Content Management solution used for the County’s Internet site is available for internal use and will allow departments to maintain their own content. Finally, this Content Management solution also provides a Project Portfolio solution built-in that will be of great benefit to the organization in terms of project tracking and reporting. | $0 |
STRATEGY RELATED TO THE COUNTY'S TECHNOLOGY ORGANIZATION
This section details specific strategy as it related to the technology organization utilized to manage the planning, implementation and operation of technology within the County.
Strategy Recommendation | FY09-10 funding |
Establish a Technology Steering Committee As stated earlier, planning for technology and the use of technology within the County is the responsibility of ALL departments, not just Information Technology. The County should establish a steering committee that meets regularly to address planning and management of technology within the County including prioritization of Information Technology resources. This committee has the shared responsibility of ensuring technology resources are being applied to appropriate tasks and projects. This will ensure Information Technology works on issues that are important from a governmental business perspective as determined by the departments in the County. | |
STATUS: The County formed the Technology Steering committee in fiscal 2003. That committee has changed membership slightly to include additional department representatives. The committee charter is available on the County’s website. | |
Increase Staff Knowledge Consistent with Current Industry Best Practices Moving forward with technology, it will be necessary to move the Information Technology staff along with the evolution of technology in terms of their knowledge. The County can accomplish this as new technology is migrated into the County’s environment through commercial or in-house training. | |
STATUS: The technology department is actively setting staff developmental goals on an annual basis. These goals include job specific training provided either in traditional classroom setting, webcasts, reference books and e-learning courses. | $7,000 |
Increase General Technology Knowledge and Awareness The County should take advantage of an opportunity to more fully educate employees on the technology that is currently available to aid in the execution of key functions within the County. By providing training to County employees on the use of tools and software currently available, the County should realize an immediate return on investment in terms of enhanced productivity and efficiency. | |
STATUS: The technology staff has set a goal for fiscal 2010 to begin offering County staff ‘lunch and learn’ sessions provided on a departmental basis. The sessions will be held in departmental conference locations for convenience of County staff. |
Business Domain Model
Key Business Functions
This section of the document takes the key departments as identified by the Technology Director and County Administrator and maps the Key Business Functions related to these given departments. This information is a result of the interviews that were conducted with the individual departments.
Department/Entity | Key Business Functions |
Administration | · Provide Support for Board of Supervisors · Administer Functions of County Departments |
Clerk of the Circuit Court | · Clerk of Record for Land, Deeds of Trust and other Legal Recordings · Probate Officer · Jury Management · Passports · Hunting and Fishing Licenses · Weapons Permits · Marriage Licenses |
Commissioner of the Revenue | · Assessment of Real Property · Assessment of Personal Property · Assessment of Rollback and Public Service Corporation Taxes · Tax Relief · Supplements · Abatements · State Income Tax · Mapping |
E911 | · Manage E911 Call Center |
Finance | · Financial Reporting · Risk Management · Budget Management |
Information Technology | · Operations · Telephony Systems · PC Troubleshooting and Repair · Application Development · Infrastructure and Network Management · Web Maintenance (Intranet and Intranet) · Report Design and Development · GIS |
Building Inspections | · Permits · Inspections |
Mapping and 911 Services | · Manage E911 Call Center |
Planning | · Comprehensive Plan · Planning Requests for Property · Erosion Permits |
Public Safety | · Fire and Rescue · HazMat · Search and Rescue · Confined Spaces · Animal Control |
Franklin County Public Schools | · Student Information System · Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable · Payroll · General Ledger (Expenses) |
Sheriff Department | · Law Enforcement · Operation of Jail · Transport Inmates · Execute Warrants · Court Security · Criminal Investigation · General Patrol · Timesheet Management |
Department of Social Services | · Financial Assistance and Social Services Programs · Internal Personnel and Accounting · Accounts Payable |
Treasurer | · Collects, Maintains and Disburses Local Funds · Collects and Deposits State Funds · Collect and Hold Funds for Others · State Income Tax |