The New Bedford Committee on Finance on Oct. 16 voted to receive and place on file an order to transfer $132,572 from police purchase-of-services to MIS (Management Information Services) purchase-of-services for firewall subscriptions, the committee chair said.

The transfer covers annual subscriptions for two city firewalls: one at City Hall and one at the Police Department. Jonathan Nunes, covering for John Coster in MIS, said the subscriptions include security and software updates for the devices. “There are 2 firewalls currently in the network. We have 1 over at the police department and then 1 over at city hall,” Nunes said.

Why it matters: MIS staff said the subscriptions are required to maintain security features on Palo Alto equipment that the city now uses. Without the subscriptions, officials warned, security updates and vendor support could lapse.

Details and discussion: Nunes and Bob Ekstrom briefed the committee. Nunes said the police firewall subscriptions were mistakenly budgeted in the police account instead of MIS. He gave the two line-item amounts shown in the memorandum: $74,009.74 for the larger city firewall and $57,562.00 (rounded) for the police firewall, for a total of about $132,572.

Ekstrom described MIS’s role: the department “controls, operates, and does all the repairs on” the firewalls and has staff on site to upgrade and maintain them. Nunes said the City Hall device has been in place for about three years while the police firewall is newer and this is its first year with an active subscription. He said the city selected Palo Alto for its security features.

Next steps: Chair Linda Morad said the transfer will appear on the City Council agenda for final action on Oct. 23. The committee did not vote to approve the transfer in committee; it took the procedural step to receive the communication and place it on file.

Ending: The city’s MIS and police representatives said they will provide any additional detail the council requests before the Oct. 23 meeting.