IT manager seeks legislation to migrate city to Microsoft 365 Government G3 to boost cybersecurity
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Summary
IT manager told council the city plans to migrate to Microsoft 365 Government G3 to raise cybersecurity protections after regional ransomware incidents; staff said the migration is budgeted, will be phased over about two months and will include an email-domain change and staff training.
City IT staff asked council to prepare legislation to migrate city email and systems to Microsoft 365 Government G3, saying the upgrade will raise the city's cybersecurity posture and help guard against ransomware and other cyberattacks.
Todd Wallace, the city’s IT manager, said the upgrade is a budgeted item and that the city has been planning the move “basically ever since Huber Heights had their little incident.” He described the package as a government-tier licensing level that “puts us up into a government version of it, which is about 7 levels up,” and said the change provides stronger monitoring, email protection and anti-spam features.
Wallace said the city will migrate rather than perform a simple in-place upgrade and estimated onboarding at about two months, though he cautioned the work “will probably drag on a little bit.” He also said the migration will include changing the city's email domain from moraine0h.org to moraineohio.gov and that, historically, the old address can remain reachable for a transition window — in past migrations he said that window has run as long as six months.
The IT manager said roughly 24 machines still need updating out of “over a 100” and emphasized the need for user training because even well-configured systems are vulnerable to malicious email. He also said the city obtained a special rate through a partnership with MBECa that saves “over $10,000 on state bid” and that the arrangement offers the city more direct control of licensing than a third-party reseller.
Council moved to have legislation prepared for the upgrade. On the motion to draft legislation, roll-call votes recorded in the meeting minutes show unanimous or near-unanimous support (all council members recorded in the roll call voted yes). The motion directs staff to prepare ordinance or contract language to bring to the next meeting; it does not by itself authorize contract execution.
Wallace said the product naming used in the meeting is Microsoft 365 G3 government tier and characterized it as “the second from the top” he called a higher-security offering. He noted the city previously moved from local servers to Office March (Office 365) and that this migration will improve email encryption and monitoring capabilities that the city lacks today.
Council members asked clarifying questions about timeline and the relationship with MBECa and the benefits of the agreement. Staff highlighted the need for follow-on work: device migrations, communications to residents and a training rollout for employees. The Committee of the Whole voted to prepare the legislation so council can consider the formal contract and budget language at the next meeting.
