ITEM:

CONSENT CALENDAR

 

5.

CONSIDER EXPENDITURE OF BUDGETED FUNDS FOR PURCHASE OF COMPUTER SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE FOR DISTRICT-WIDE UPGRADES  

 

Meeting Date:
June 18, 2007

Budgeted: 

Yes

 

From:

David A. Berger,

Program/

Capital Assets

 

General Manager

Line Item No.:     Account No. 99-01-9160

 

Prepared By:

Inder-Mohan S. Osahan

Cost Estimate:

$ 34,600

 

 

 

 

Chief Financial Officer Review:  Yes

General Counsel Approval:  N/A

Committee Recommendation:  The Administrative Committee considered this item on June 7, 2007 and recommended approval.

CEQA Compliance:  N/A

 

SUMMARY:  District staff is requesting authorization to purchase replacement servers and several personal computers, along with new software to pilot/plan an upgrade for the replacement of all old personal computers and related software and hardware currently being used. District staff originally planned to upgrade this equipment prior to June 2006, but due to budgeting constraints, the upgrade project was postponed to Fiscal Year (FY) 2006-07. The replacement of this equipment was further delayed pending the release of a brand new operating system (Vista) and office suite (MS-Office 2007) on January 30, 2007.  These new releases made it more advantageous for the District to pilot the project, work out the bugs and then upgrade to new personal computers in FY 07-08.  The upgrade to Vista and MS-Office 2007 will make the software used by the District compatible with that will be used by the majority of the members of the public, consultants and other agencies that the District interacts with.  In addition to the above equipment, staff is also requesting authorization to purchase other budgeted equipment for CD/DVD cloning, data redundancy and network backup.  Exhibit 5-A is a listing of all equipment to be purchased at this time.

 

RECOMMENDATION:  Authorize the General Manager to purchase computer equipment in the amount of approximately $34,600. 

 

BACKGROUND:  The District has all personal computers on a three-year replacement schedule and they were last replaced in June 2002.  New computers were originally scheduled for FY 2005-06, but were deferred at that time due to budget constraints.  However, since that time various components including monitors, hard drives, video cards, network cards and main boards have started to fail requiring significant repairs; and funds for computer replacements were included in the FY 2006-07 budget.  When the old computers are replaced, District staff also desires to upgrade to Vista and MS-Office 2007 to have the newest versions of software that will be compatible with what will be used by the majority of the members of the public, consultants and other agencies that the District interacts with.  The software package includes Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook.  The replaced computers will either be held for future disposal or traded in if the price received is at the market level comparable to units of this age.

 

IMPACT ON STAFF AND RESOURCES:  The FY 2006-2007 Information Technology budget includes sufficient funds in the Capital Assets portion of the budget for these purchases.  Funds for the deferred work station replacements will be moved from FY 2006-07 to FY 2007-08.

 

EXHIBITS

5-A      IT Equipment List for Replacement and Upgrades

 

 

U:\staff\word\boardpacket\2007\2007boardpackets\20070618\ConsentCal\05\item5.doc