What Happened?
The town of Middleboro, Mass., eliminated a $90,000 position, the director of management information systems, as a means of consolidating IT under the school department’s technology services administrator.
Implementation
The town’s IT director position was eliminated. Remaining town IT staff will continue to work from town hall, but will report to the new tech services director at the school department. Though the town’s top IT position was eliminated, an IT administrative assistant was added, at a cost of $39,500. Overall, the town’s IT budget will be $13,000 lower than last year, at $272,000.
Is this a big deal?
While the $13,000 in savings may not seem much, the consolidation of department heads paves the way for other areas of savings. With school superintendents and town administration often butting heads over control of budgets and resources, it is rare for the two parties to agree to shared services or bi-departmentalism.
Other low hanging fruit for sharing within town and school systems would be facility management, finance, payroll, and human resources.
Action Items
For those interested, a “How To” Guide to Consolidation was published by the Pioneer Institute, based on the consolidation efforts in Barnstable, Mass.
The Mass. Department of Revenue also issued a detailed report for Arlington concerning consolidation of town and school finance departments.
For related coverage, see this article on East Hartford, CT, where the city council voted to consolidate school and city IT, payroll and accounts payable systems. The original story on Middleboro can be found here.