Parma Clerk of Courts seeks new servers, flags $36,000 off‑site records storage cost

Clerk of Courts staff told Parma City Council their general fund budget shows little substantive change year-over-year but identified two technology and capital requests: Fund 165 (Clerk of Court Computerization) and Fund 167 (Capital/Property Maintenance).

Clerk representative Mr. Vittardi noted the office is largely 'state of the art' for court computerization but must replace aging hardware. IT manager Kevin Bergen described a quote for three new HP Gen11 servers to replace end-of-life physical servers and dozens of virtual servers that are "12 plus years old." Bergen said the current proposal is for on-premises hardware with five-year licensing and left the door open to hybrid cloud options in the future. He tied the timing to compliance concerns, citing House Bill 96 cybersecurity mandates affecting cities, villages and townships in Ohio.

Council members asked whether cloud-based options had been considered; Bergen said the quoted hardware includes cloud integration capacity but the current formal quote is for on-prem equipment and licensing. He confirmed informal retail quotes had been obtained but formal bidding had not yet occurred and that the quoted amounts represent a maximum that the city would not exceed without further approval.

Separately, the Clerk explained a new $36,000 line under rentals/leases is an exact fee for off-site storage of older court records on Ridge Road; some records must be retained for up to 50 years, and the city uses off-site storage to meet retention obligations while keeping current files digitized.

The council asked follow-up questions about procurement steps, licenses and whether the expenditure would be split across equipment and professional services line items; the clerk said licensing and software are budgeted under professional services and equipment under capital lines.