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2008-06-05  ALPHARETTA AND ROSWELL REVUE & NEWS | Alpharetta debates more staff
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| | by Bob Pepalis | |  |
June 12, 2008
www.northfulton.com
ALPHARETTA -- City Council still wants an adaptive traffic control system, but a tight budget and weak economy have its main propnent, Councilman David Belle Isle, willing to start with a pilot program instead of rolling out the entire multi-million dollar system.
That same outlook on the budget had council members questioning the need for any new personnel at Monday night's workshop.
Alpharetta increased its budget $3.6 million to a proposed $56.5 million for fiscal year 2009.
Belle Isle led the charge for the city to install the traffic control system that allows constant adjustments to the flow of traffic through traffic signals. He wanted to start at 60 of the city's most heavily traveled intersections. But he offered to cut his proposed capital expenditure to $200,000 adding it to the $610,00 already in this year's budget, to start installation on a smaller scale.
Council members, led by a suggestion from Councilman D.C. Aiken, seemed ready to agree to approve moving ahead with installing it on a single major arterial road before committing to the $5.6 million to install it at the 60 intersections proposed.
"You can't fix a bad intersection with this system from everything I've read," said Councilman Doug DeRito.
Several residents questioned cutting funding for what Alpharetta residents identified as the biggest problem in the city.
The city's Information Technology director, Randy Bundy, was grilled by council on why he needs another full-time network analyst and a part-time administrative assistant.
Bundy said the city's computer network is being held together by "chewing gum and baling wire." His staff spends most of its time keeping it operating, with no time for improvements. The network system has none of the tools that allow the IT staff to manage the city's computer systems.
His network manager, Joel Williams, agreed with that assessment.
"I have to say I was a little bit shocked in what we had in place here," Williams said.
The network is not secure, using home networking hardware. The 60 physical servers are spread out across the city and many are not in secure locations.
"If we establish the position, our chances of eliminating the position are next to zero," Belle Isle said.
Mayor Arthur Letchas ended the discussion for the night.
"In this department, I think we've shortchanged IT over the past few years," Letchas said.
This is the year for IT to come up to standards, he said, something done for other departments in previous years.
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Alpha taxes
Alpharetta plans three public hearings and two readings of the budget ordinance and proposed millage rate in City Hall:
June 12
11:30 a.m., public hearing
6:30 p.m., public hearing, first reading of ordinance
June 19, 7:30 p.m., public hearing, second reading of ordinance. | |
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