Technology Committee Minutes 08.21.12

August 22, 2012 Andrew Pinard Minutes, Technology Committee 0

Technology meeting 8.21.12

Meeting opened at 6:30 pm with Bill Thompson, Jon Marden, Andrew Pinard and Cheryl Behr present. The question was raised regarding the existence of a charge from the selectmen and Cheryl answered there was no formal charge at this time.

The group discussed many of the issues regarding the need for an organized method of handling technology matters going forward. These issues include:

  1. Prepare an inventory of current equipment, age, capacity, applications by departments versions, security issues and need for the sharing of information via network or migrating shared applications to the information “cloud”.
  2. The establishment of an IT policy for the town to cover the procedure for replacement and upgrading equipment to insure compatibility with other town equipment as well as other outside sources. Obtain copy of different existing IT plans
  3. The need to establish standards and a training program for all departments
  4. The establishment of a specific technology department with a budget to manage the replacement and servicing decisions for all departments
  5. The need for increased trained volunteers or perhaps part time staff to accomplish the above.
  6. Various storage medium for historic materials and the possibility of using part time volunteers or IT personnel to complete the scanning of these records. Possibility of an intern program to accomplish the work. Need to identify the magnitude of the project and establish reasonable goals for completion.
  7. Regionalize the IT function. The school system has a well developed plan.
  8. Back ups – frequency and type. Disaster control. “fire drills” periodically to insure backups are working and establish the length of time to restore. Understand the liabilities involved with down time.
  9. Costs
  10. Discussion on establishing a “one button” recording system for all committee and board meetings.
    1. Transportability to other locations for maximum use.
    2. New transcription machine for the secretary.
    3. Discontinue use of cassette tapes
    4. Installation of permanent speakers and microphone locations in rooms
    5. Reduce the time required of the volunteer to reproduce the recording format for posting on the web site.
    6. Storage of copies of recordings
    7. Expand to video recording as well – cost
    8. Cost of licensing video time

This was an organizational meeting. The scope and charge will be fine tuned as we proceed.

The priorities associated with the above were discussed. Cheryl Behr indicated the recording of meetings and the ease of set up were of special importance to her department to avoid legal challenges. Prior experience with recording set ups at the town hall underscored the need for simplicity. If not easy and fool proof, it won’t get used.

Recurring themes of the need for volunteers (perhaps part time staff ) and costs were expressed. The next meeting date was set for September 27th (Thursday). At 6:30 pm

Tasks for the next meeting:

  1. Andrew Pinard will research the availability of an alternate digital recording system to try out at a selectmen’s meeting. Andrew will also obtain a copy of the School IT Policy.
  2. Bill will continue to record the Selectmen’s meetings. He will work with Marge going forward with training
  3. Cheryl will work on the inventory of equipment and applications
  4. Jon Marden will research a alternate recording method for transcription purposes.