DRAFT Minutes of Technology Advisory Board Meeting of November 15, 2005

Present: J Tasse, Chairman, T. Aabo, G. Eggleston, M. Schorr, P. St. John

Absent: J. Kelley, S. Verola-Town Board liaison

The meeting was called to order at 7:08 pm.

1.      The minutes of the 9-20-05 meeting were approved with one correction – T. Aabo was absent on 9/20.

2.   Eggleston handed out new computer and software inventory summary charts.   

3.   St. John gave Tasse fax sheets with a listing of the software available for equipment maintenance tracking, road rating (from Joel Cochran). The county people use some and have their own system that they have developed per J. Cochran. Paul has seen Quick Books (software) for sale. Paul will next talk to R. Gavin re-Gavin’s plans. The 2006 budget has money for Gavin to have a clerk.

4.  Meeting minute software was discussed. The Town Clerk software demo on 11/7/05 was impressive according to Tasse and Eggleston who attended the demo. The Records Advisory Group has written an application for a grant for software and a scanner. The Town budget has money for a disc with 10,000 pages (General Code Publishers will scan in the pages) of past Town Board minutes. The grant would pay for the rest of the software and the scanner (records management software, inputer license and searcher license). In the next phase someone would label the files. Some training comes with the disc (phase 1) – 1 hour phone training. The Town Board voted to adopt that plan.  

5.  Old Business: Status of the new CD burner. Not available- J. Kelley absent from meeting. He was to meet with the Town Clerk to install the CD burner.  Document backup was discussed and where to store the backups (Iron Mountain or the Highway Dept. garage). A good vault and offsite backup storage is what is needed. The Zoning Administrator backs up periodically with a CD burner.

6.   BAS Integrated Property System software was in Tasse’s mailbox. This is the same sort of software as the Town Clerk’s software being looked at. It is an alternate from the same company. It is software for building inspectors (for code enforcement) and other municipal employees (e.g., assessors).

7. The computer access issue discussed at the 9/20 meeting is not a technology issue. Heather can start up the book keeper’s computer. 

8. The specs for the new Town Hall were discussed. Tasse (and other members of the TAB) should meet with the Town Board and the architect to find out the status of the specs. The TAB should be able to examine the drawings and specs to see where money might be saved and costs reduced, e.g., the emergency generator and wiring at $100K.  A heat pump with propane backup might make more sense than just propane as the primary heating source.

The meeting was adjourned at 8:36 pm.

Prepared by M. Schorr