Board mulls consolidating IT departments

Date: 11/23/2010

Nov. 22, 2010

By Chris Maza

Reminder Assistant Editor

LONGMEADOW -- On Nov. 15, the Select Board conducted an open hearing to discuss the consolidation of the town's information technology (IT) services.

"We've been talking about that for the last three meetings," Robert Aseltine, Select Board Chairman, said. "We held the open hearing as required by the charter. He heard from members of the community and the board and now the next step is to bring it up again at the next [Select Board] meeting."

Aseltine said the main focus of the consolidation of the town and schools' separate IT departments is to streamline service.

"Our hope in combining the departments is to provide better service and increase efficiency," Aseltine said. "We also want there to be consistent technological standards. There's an awful lot of software being used that is not consistent from department to department."

"We have very knowledgeable staff and we want to be able to take advantage of that knowledge and put it towards other departments," he added.

Should the consolidation be approved by the Select Board, an IT advisory committee would be established.

"What we'd like to do is have the advisory committee set up a long-term technological strategy for the town moving forward," Aseltine said. "We would want this committee to help develop a plan to develop a technological infra-structure for the future."