Council pulls Laserfiche contract from consent agenda, authorizes staff to seek termination-for-cause language

Council members questioned a proposed Laserfiche electronic-records contract (consent-agenda item 'e'), focusing on security, portability, indexing capacity and whether a five-year pricing guarantee should include a termination-for-cause clause. After extended discussion, the council pulled the item from the consent agenda for further negotiation and later authorized staff to seek contract amendments with Laserfiche.

Concerns centered on whether Laserfiche employees could access sensitive files during troubleshooting, whether the system is non‑proprietary and portable if the vendor ceased operations, and whether the proposed five-year pricing guarantee would lock the city into paying the remaining balance if the agreement were terminated early. “I would be a lot more comfortable if there was language in here for termination for cause,” Councilmember Maggie Bass said during deliberations.

Staff explained the city’s intended uses (personnel files, records retention and easier production of documents for data requests), that the vendor offered cloud storage and one terabyte of capacity under the presented pricing, and that most scanned content would be public records. Resident Brian Paulson cautioned about OCR quality in older scans and recommended attention to cybersecurity controls.

The council voted to approve the consent agenda with item 'e' removed, and later passed a motion authorizing designated council members and staff to work with Laserfiche to secure either termination-for-cause language in a five‑year pricing agreement or a shorter-term agreement that preserves current pricing. Staff will return with amended language for council review.