BCS seeks two-year Xerox printing extension amid network issues tied to legacy Omnibridge devices
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Summary
District staff proposed a two-year extension with Xerox that consolidates printing, scanning and document repository services into a cloud-based system, described legacy Omnibridge interoperability problems and asked board members to review the contract renewal and contingency amounts.
Birmingham City Schools staff told the board they will ask members to approve a two-year extension of the district printing and document management contract with Xerox that consolidates multiple legacy agreements into a single cloud-based service.
Doctor Stevens, presenting the item as district technology staff, said the district originally bid the print services three years earlier and is now seeking to renew optional years at a proposed total not to exceed $5,280,000 for the two-year extension. “We actually, bid this 3 years ago, and we have 2 optional years to renew at a cost of 2,400,000.0 and we're asking for a 10% contingency for each of the years and for that total not to exceed the $5,280,000 for the 2 year,” Stevens told the board.
Stevens said the contract consolidates multiple legacy services — including DocuShare document repository and on-site technical support — into one umbrella agreement, and that the contract covers about 950 printing devices across schools and sites. She described a deployment pilot and said Xerox performed a root-cause analysis after the district upgraded its network security; the upgrade caused many devices connected through third‑party Omnibridge boxes to “unbind” intermittently from the cloud-based service.
Sharon Eisenhower, the Xerox representative, explained technical changes planned for the district. “You can actually go in and create your own PIN for the system…If you say, ‘Oh, I forgot my badge today,’ you generate a PIN,” Eisenhower said, describing follow‑me printing, Google/OneDrive scanning integration and cloud print queues during the pilot.
Board members asked about implementation timing and potential classroom disruption while installers remove the Omnibridge hardware. Stevens said the district plans to stage updates outside of school hours and perform most work over the summer; Xerox has committed to maintaining legacy connectivity during migration. She also told board members the district will keep five on-site technical support staff under the arrangement to respond to end-user problems and to reduce recurring downtime.
The item remained a work-session presentation; Stevens said staff intend to present a formal approval request at a future meeting after completing vendor negotiations and confirming contract language matches bid documentation.