Chautauqua County’s Administrative Services Committee on Friday approved setting the salary for a newly created network security analyst position, a role county officials say will strengthen the county’s cybersecurity capacity.

John D'Angelo, chief information officer for Chautauqua County, told the committee the position was budgeted for 2025 and included in planning for 2026. He said human resources assigned the job a grade 24 and the starting hourly rate was stated in the record as $35.21 per hour.

D'Angelo described the position as focused on the county’s cybersecurity work, noting it will “take care of all of our firewalls, our external presence” and work with server and infrastructure teams. He said the county has not yet posted the position; pending approval the county will complete the civil service process and expects to post the job in January or early February.

The committee approved the salary-setting motion by voice vote. The meeting record did not include a roll-call vote or named vote tally.

Next steps: once the civil service and posting steps are complete, county staff will begin recruitment; D'Angelo said he hopes to find a local candidate but anticipates the candidate pool may come from outside the county given the specialized skills required.