Library, village projects to upgrade technology – Garden City News

Friday, April 12, 2024
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As the Garden City Village Board of Trustees deliberated on the 2024-25 budget in late March, Village Administrator Ralph V. Suozzi shared notes on the increased headcount in the Administration budget and the sharing of resources to upgrade the Library’s information technology infrastructure.
The Board listened at its budget work session on Wednesday March 20, as Administrator Suozzi  described the cost centers included within the Administration Budget accounts: the Board of Trustees expenses, the Village Justice, Administrative and Village Clerk’s Office staff and equipment, Personnel/HR, and Central Data Processing (referred to as IT), Publicity and the Village Historian.
The overall Administration budget of $2.115 million decreased 4% from the prior budget, resulting from “less reliance on third-party IT consultant services from our big tech partner, SourcePass, reduced to 12-hours per week of an on-site resource which allows for savings of $57,600. In addition we eliminated the blocks of time which amounted to approximately $35,000 in prior years’ expenses,” Suozzi told the Board. 
The former consultants to the village Total Technology Solutions now operate as a subsidiary of SourcePass.
The primary reasons for increased costs are salary-related expenses, going up from $1.249 million this year to $1.283 million in the 2024-25 budget, as well as the Maintenance of Software budget line. 
Administrator Suozzi described the software needs as system wide, the Village of Garden City changed platforms from Microsoft Office 365 to a new version which includes enhanced cybersecurity features, “that will isolate our Microsoft network products from the outside world to prevent any hacking from occurring.” 
The expiration of the village’s software licenses also increased the Maintenance of Software increase, but that will not be a recurring cost to the programs’ five-year renewals, Suozzi said.
The increase of one headcount in Administration is for an Info Tech Aide II to work alongside the village’s senior IT Specialist Ryan Sheehan, as the new hire will work alongside him and provide full coverage for the village’s business hours on weekdays. Sheehan arrives very early in mornings to assist in Garden City Police tech needs and reporting. The new person’s schedule will overlap his shift.
In addition the IT hire will work with the library staff for their needs.
“For a number of years I’ve encouraged the GCPL to develop a consulting relationship with a big IT partner as the village has successfully done for the last five years. The Board of Trustees recently approved a resolution allowing the library to hire SourcePass for the remainder of the fiscal year (through May 31) and the Library Budget includes funding for a full year of the IT support – but as part of village budgeting strategy I’ve asked the library to offset 20% of this cost, for the employee to work at GCPL one day every week to have them learn and assist on both network environments, and to provide backup for both Ryan Sheehan and GCPL’s Computer Systems Librarian Joe Agolia who has been the library’s sole IT resource,” Suozzi explained. 
A major task the new hire will be an integral part of is the migration of GCPL’s network infrastructure to “parallel the modernization and changes we have already performed throughout the village networks.” The GCPL system includes connectivity and levels of integration with the Nassau Library System (NLS) network and resources.
The village’s Administration budget includes 13 full-time positions, with the increase of one headcount from the 2023-24 budget. In September 2023, the budget was modified to include a Village Justice Court clerk and the transfer out of a principal account clerk (serving as a payroll processing job) from Administration into the Finance Department’s budget. After a question from Mayor Mary Carter Flanagan comparing the increased headcount to that of the 2023-24 budget, Administrator Suozzi said that the total is only a ‘net gain of one.’
He explained to the trustees, “our payroll function is being segregated from the HR function in our Administration division, effective from the start of the next fiscal year on June 1, at the recommendations of the village’s two independent auditors and at the direction of the Finance & Audit Committee. We’ve already transferred the person to Finance.”
Mayor Carter Flanagan reviewed the budget and said setting aside the principal account clerk shifted into Finance, there was a spot added a year ago with the court clerk (for the current fiscal year) and another for the Info Tech Aide II was added for 2024-2025.
Benefits and taxes for the Administration expense budget were not presented at the March 20 budget work session, but Suozzi noted the costs at approximately $595,000.
Suozzi also presented details of the Administration’s capital projects including the $259,000 Village Hall Computer Room renovation project, which had updated design specs due to overhead pipes. 
Noted in the capital projects’ data, $230,000 is remaining on the Computer Room renovation as only $29,000 has been encumbered for design spec work. 
Suozzi estimated that the design work should be completed by about mid-May, and it will take about six to nine months for the construction, wiring and network fittings.
Administrator Suozzi commented that the improvements to the village’s network have been worthwhile so far and the old wiring has been rectified and secured.
The $125,000 budgeted capital amount for the coming year will go towards two to three new file servers which are at the end of their useful lives and need to be upgraded. 
For the five-year Administration capital projects outlook, a $100,000 lump sum was allocated for the Digital Scanning project in FY 2025-2026. Suozzi said it would be a placeholder for the project, and the digital scanning was not proposed for other budget years’ in the five-year outlook with the newly adopted budget. He suggested there wouldn’t need to be a five-year capital funding plan for that project.
“As you know we must keep permanent digital records, so we are scanning files – the scanning is one part of it and the second part involves verification of files and data. For records we need to keep for up to six years, those are not being scanned” Suozzi noted.
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