Innovation and efficiency are top priorities for Dan Horrigan, and rightly so. As Akron faces the expense of a major sewer upgrade and the financial pressure of cutbacks in state funding for local governments, the new mayor has emphasized delivering quality services within existing revenues.
That is why the objections of some members of the City Council to a plan to share information technology services with Summit County are disappointing. Russ Neal and Linda Omobien are right to ask questions. Look closely, and their concerns about the city losing control of its information technology are unfounded. The mayor’s proposal deserves approval at today’s meeting.
Area residents are fortunate that the city and Summit County have a successful history of collaboration. Some deals have involved full mergers, such as the county’s takeover of the city building department and the merger of the county, Akron and Barberton health departments.
What Horrigan now has in mind for the city’s information technology does not involve a merger. His legislation merely would establish an agreement with the county that would set below-market rates for the city’s understaffed IT operations to purchase basic services from the larger Summit County Department of Information Technology. The agreement could work the other way, too, but that is considered unlikely.
The plan fits well with the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Task Force appointed by the mayor, which urged the city to pursue operational efficiencies. It also fits with what the county has accomplished. Its IT department is the result of a charter amendment in 2014 that consolidated information technology and data processing operations.
By spending less than $100,000 a year to purchase such services as helping employees with logins and passwords and responding when computers crash, the city’s eight technology workers (down from 18 in 2008) would be free to pursue ideas to use information technology in new and creative ways.
As explained by James Hardy, the mayor’s chief of staff, IT employees would look at ways to gather data and put information to use making city services leaner and more responsive. One example is the city of Columbus, which this summer won a $40 million “smart city” grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation. Ideas include using sensors to monitor parking availability, provide real-time data on traffic and even (someday) connect workers to jobs using driverless vehicles.
More broadly, the mayor sees using data from all city operations to better manage the city and provide the public with ways to report information (such as potholes) and access it.
The benefits of such innovations would be well worth such a modest investment. The reality is, the purchase of basic information technology services from Summit County would give the city more control, not less. The council should not stall things any longer. It should approve the mayor’s proposal, embracing more collaboration with the county and more creative uses of technology.