Sunday, May 5, 2024
Courtesy of Hood County
An unexpected $220,750 bill to the county caused by the refusal of County Clerk Katie Lang and Precinct 4 Justice of the Peace Dub Gillum to finish converting their offices to software authorized by the Commissioners Court will apparently have to be paid, the Hood County News has learned.
There had been hope that the extra expense might be mitigated.
Both Lang and Gillum softened their stance against switching to Tyler Odyssey software at the end of an almost two-and-a-half-hour special meeting of the Commissioners Court on Tuesday and agreed to work with the county on a resolution. However, it is no longer possible for the original terms of the contract to be met, according to Greg Wallace, project manager for Tyler Technologies, which is handling the conversion.
According to an email sent by Wallace to county officials late Thursday, neither of those offices will be able to catch up in the conversion process in time to go live with the rest of the county on Dec. 5.
A contract amendment for a second phase focused only on the County Clerk and JP4 offices is now necessary and will involve an additional 1,250 hours of work, according to Tyler representatives.
County IT Director Drew Wiederkehr told the county judge and commissioners that in his view the cost is likely justified.
The special meeting earlier this week was called after the county received the invoice and notification from Tyler that the scope of the project will have to be amended so that it can be completed in two phases rather than one.
By law, commissioners courts have the authority to make technology decisions for all county offices except for the county auditor’s office.
The court decided in a 3-2 vote to switch to Tyler Odyssey for a more streamlined system that will prevent some offices from having to enter data twice.
Lang and Gillum balked at the change, preferring to stay with NetData. They said that converting the many files in their offices to Tyler Odyssey was overwhelming.
At the end of the special meeting, which was open to the public, it was determined that the court would table the matter until its regular meeting on Tuesday, Nov. 8.
It was agreed that additional information would be sought from Tyler Technologies in hopes that Gillum’s office, if not Lang’s, might be able to catch up with other offices in time for the go-live date, possibly saving the county money.
Wallace’s email, sent at 5:43 p.m. Thursday, appeared to confirm that the additional cost of $220,750 will stand.
