Board approves Schneider GIS training contract and hears IT budget pressures

The Pine County Board approved a Schneider GIS training contract (24 hours) to support county staff training at a cost of $11,777 through 2028, to be paid from the recorder compliance fund. The motion followed discussion about the contract's three-year term and the value of targeted, on-demand training versus multi-day off-site programs.

IT Director Ryan Faddell presented the department's budget overview, noting personnel constitutes about 41% of the IT budget, services and maintenance about 48%, and hardware and software about 11%. He described subscription-cost increases (Microsoft licensing, Tyler, endpoint detection and other services), a roughly $44,670 increase over 2026 for the IT department and rising hardware prices (hard drives and servers). Faddell also recommended increasing the county technology fund back toward $100,000 to enable larger networking and infrastructure projects.

"We have to upgrade things... we leave ourselves exposed to vulnerabilities and security problems if we're not on currently supported stuff," Faddell said, explaining the county maintains an end-of-life document to track equipment that is no longer supported and must be replaced. He also described layered security: endpoint detection/response, a 24/7 security operations center contracted through the state and staff phishing training.

Why it matters: The contracted training aims to keep staff productive on GIS tools while budget pressures from subscription licensing and aging equipment push the county to prioritize fund replenishment and multi-year planning for networking and servers.