IT requests $729,653 increase for devices, licensing and backup as county documents rising costs

Eric Caldwell, who leads the county IT department, outlined a $729,653 FY27 increase in the countywide IT services budget driven chiefly by device rollouts, data center licensing and contracted services. He said the largest portion of the jump is a worst‑case estimate for a PC and laptop replacement rollout and noted supply‑chain pressures driven by global demand for memory chips.

"Our request this year is $729,653 more than last year," Eric said, then explained that the department uses conservative, high-end estimates at request time because firm vendor quotes are often not available until purchase. He highlighted a $309,000 jump in contract services that includes the CAD upgrade project, subscriptions for radio phase 2 rollouts and GPS monitoring, plus a $148,000 increase for leased on‑premise backup storage rather than a multimillion-dollar capital purchase.

Eric told commissioners the department will pursue state contracts and multi‑agency cooperative buys where practical but noted that even state contracts do not always guarantee the best price in a constrained market. Commissioners thanked IT for prior-year work and asked for follow-up on procurement strategies and cost-variance tracking.