Clare County board approves software purchase and loan to move county tax system to the cloud

At a special meeting, the Clare County board approved a motion to purchase and finance county tax software and to apply a $495,185 cybersecurity grant toward a planned migration of the county’s tax system to a cloud platform.

The action, moved by the chair and approved by roll call, authorizes a loan/purchase for $256,024.08 and directs the board chair to sign associated documents. The presenter told the board that three county servers will be obsolete in January 2027 and that replacing them would cost more than $100,000, creating urgency to move to a cloud-hosted system.

Why it matters: county staff said the migration would eliminate near-term hardware replacement costs and fit within an awarded cybersecurity grant. Members pressed staff and the presenter on vendor approval, support staffing, module costs and training logistics before the vote.

Presenter (S3) said the county received a cybersecurity grant and described the migration effort as an 18-month project. "The grant was $495,185," the presenter said. She also told the board, "we have 3 servers that are gonna be obsolete in January '27," and said moving to the cloud would avoid roughly six-figure hardware replacements.

Board members asked how quickly the vendor could onboard the county and whether the vendor was listed as an approved provider with the Michigan Tax Commission. The presenter said one vendor the county examined is not listed as an approved vendor and that obtaining that approval can take years. She also said the vendor had offered to expedite the county’s onboarding and that a December go-live was possible if the county were prioritized.

Members discussed the financial trade-offs of switching systems. One member warned of "sunk costs" if the county pays to upgrade to a vendor’s cloud and later needs to switch. Board members discussed keeping financial functions separate from the tax-cloud deployment to reduce migration risk, but several noted operational advantages to an integrated solution.

The presenter clarified that certain modules—specifically a building-department module quoted in the discussion at about $14,000—would be charged to the building department and that the county might need to front payment and be reimbursed in a later fiscal year. The transcript recorded a per-thousand fee question (quoted approximately as "$0.06 per 1,000 on our $55"); the presenter said those costs would be allocated among departments using the platform.

A committee member raised support-capacity concerns based on other jurisdictions' experience. "Did you check with them on support? ... Make sure they have enough staff," the committee member said. The presenter responded that staffing and support had been raised in vendor meetings and were a standing concern.

On the motion, the board took a roll-call vote. The transcript records affirmative votes from Madraske; Hauser; Haskell; Gross; Gilmore; Jenkins; Representatives; and K. The chair announced, "Motion carried." The motion’s recorded loan/purchase amount was $256,024.08 and the board directed the chair to sign the paperwork.

Next steps: staff will proceed with vendor contracting and onboarding under the approved financing arrangement and with grant funding applied as available. The presenter warned departments that some module charges may need to be fronted and reimbursed in the next fiscal year.

Notes on transcript terminology: the transcript contains multiple, inconsistent acronyms for the county tax system (rendered variously as "SNA," "BSNA," "BSMA" and "PSNA"). This article refers to the county’s tax software generally to avoid introducing errors where the transcript’s acronym usage is inconsistent.