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County outlines joint committees with Fairfax schools to pursue cost savings, IT pilots
Summary
Staff described joint county‑school committees to seek cost efficiencies in capital, procurement and IT, including device‑as‑a‑service pilots, shared procurement and AI helpdesk trials; committees aim to start in October with recommendations by March 2026.
Fairfax County staff on Sept. 16 described planned joint committees with Fairfax County Public Schools aimed at finding cost reductions and operational efficiencies, particularly in capital planning and information technology.
Joe Lahate (staff) told the Budget Committee the panels will examine project life cycles, procurement strategies and opportunities for co‑location of facilities to avoid duplication. "Everything's on the table," he said, listing topics from contracting and permitting to public‑private partnership options and colocation opportunities such as Kingstowne and Mount Vernon campus planning.
Matthew Harrison, the county's director of information technology, outlined IT‑specific work for the joint IT committee: pilots of device‑as‑a‑service for laptops and Chromebooks to reduce internal imaging and deployment costs; joint purchasing and consolidated bidding for devices, cloud and cybersecurity tools; shared tooling for incident management and potential use of AI to handle routine helpdesk tickets.
Harrison said the county is already piloting proof‑of‑concepts for these approaches and will meet with school IT counterparts to coordinate before formal committee work begins. He said shared device management and joint procurement "gives us an opportunity, especially with the number of Chromebooks the schools have," to realize savings.
Lahate said staff expect to begin meetings in October and deliver draft recommendations by March 2026. The board chair and members emphasized that the committees should be narrowly focused on cost reduction and efficiency, not on generating new cost‑increasing initiatives. Staff said they would bring outside experts where appropriate and would coordinate schedules so committee members and school representatives can commit time to an aggressive calendar.
The committees will be open to board members and the public; staff will circulate draft mission statements and agendas and report back as the school side provides feedback.
