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ITEM: |
CONSENT CALENDAR |
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24. |
CONSIDER APPROVING 3-YEAR AGREEMENT WITH DEVEERA, INC. FOR INFORMATION
TECHNOLOGY SERVICES |
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Meeting
Date: |
June 20, 2023 |
Budgeted: |
Yes |
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From: |
David J.
Stoldt, |
Program/ |
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General
Manager |
Line Item No. : |
IT Services |
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Prepared
By: |
Suresh
Prasad |
Cost Estimate: |
$192,900
(2023-2024 $62,500; 2024-2025 $64,200; 2025-2026 $66,200) |
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General Counsel Review: N/A |
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Committee Recommendation: The Finance and Administration Committee reviewed this item on June 12, 2023 and recommended the original request for a 5-year agreement be changed to 3-year due to future staffing changes within the District. |
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CEQA Compliance: This action does not constitute a project
as defined by the California Environmental Quality Act Guidelines Section
15378. |
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SUMMARY: With
the retirement of District’s Information Technology (IT) Manager, there was a
need to immediately find a replacement to fill that position. Based on the size and needs of the District,
the replacement of a full time IT Manager position can most effectively be
filled with the services of a consultant firm.
With only two and half weeks of retirement notice from the outgoing IT
Manager, District staff immediately started contacting IT consulting firms in
the area to solicit proposals. Three
firms were contacted (Rayne Technology, DeVeera, Inc., and Alvarez Technology).
Staff met with all three firms and went over the District’s requirements
for IT services. All three firms had representatives
spend few hours on-site going through the discovery process to gather
information. Information gathered during
this discovery process was used to compile proposals delivered by the IT
firms. Some of the services provided
will be monitoring server 24/7, server and workstation preventative
maintenance, virus and anti-spam protection, network monitoring, and help desk
support, etc.
After evaluating the District’s IT infrastructure inventory, all three
firms recommended the District immediately change its backup and disaster
recovery (BDR) system. In the event of
catastrophic IT failure, the District’s old BDR system would have taken weeks
to rebuild and recover data. There could
potentially have been irrecoverable data losses. With the proposed change in updating the BDR
system, the recovery time would be reduced to approximately few hours with no
loss of data.
Since outsourcing IT services was a new concept to the District, staff trialed
with outsourcing the IT services on a short-term basis. This short-term trial
period was from September 2019 through June 2020.
On September 16, 2019, the Board approved a 9-month contract with DeVeera
Inc. to perform IT managed services for the District. During the initial term of the contract,
DeVeera implemented the BDR system which is now backing up District data on an
hourly basis. There were other IT
pending projects that were completed during the initial term. After initial term, the District had contract
extension for a 3-year term which will end on June 30, 2023.
Staff reached out to DeVeera for a contract extension. DeVeera has
proposed continuing the IT services for the District for a 5-year term with 3%
increase each year in costs. Continuing
with outsourcing IT services will yield savings of approximately $150,000 per
year by not hiring a full-time employee.
RECOMMENDATION: The Finance and Administration Committee recommends authorizing the General Manager or
the Administrative Services Manager/CFO to enter into a 3-year agreement with DeVeera,
Inc. to provide Information Technology services for a not-to-exceed amount of $192,900.
24-A Proposals for IT managed services from DeVeera Inc.
U:\staff\Boardpacket\2023\20230620\Consent
Calendar\24\Item-24.docx