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2011 SESSION


HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 645
Requesting the Secretary of Technology to study opportunities to facilitate cooperative procurement and sharing of custom technology applications to leverage buying power and create efficiencies for local governments. Report.

 

Agreed to by the House of Delegates, February 4, 2011
Agreed to by the Senate, February 22, 2011

 

WHEREAS, localities currently use a variety of software applications for a number of administrative and operational purposes, such as finance and accounting, zoning and land use planning, public safety, payroll, and managing employee benefits; and

WHEREAS, some localities, particularly smaller jurisdictions, may lack the financial resources or the staff expertise to acquire or develop the most efficient and cost-effective software applications for their particular needs; and

WHEREAS, coordinating state expertise and resources with those localities in need of such support could result in both financial savings and better delivery of governmental services; and

WHEREAS, such coordination may result in the identification of certain areas where software applications can be standardized, thereby creating economies of scale for local procurement purposes, which may lead to further savings; and

WHEREAS, such software could be supplemented to meet the unique needs of any particular locality interested in utilizing it; and

WHEREAS, a coordinated effort by the Commonwealth and its localities to develop such a standard software package, the use of which would not be required but that could be cost-effectively implemented, as needed, by any locality, could be of significant benefit to the Commonwealth, its localities, and citizens; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED by the House of Delegates, the Senate concurring, That the Secretary of Technology be requested to study opportunities to facilitate cooperative procurement and sharing of custom technology applications to leverage buying power and create efficiencies for local governments.

In conducting this study, the Secretary of Technology shall:

1. Develop a catalog of systems and services that are (i) currently being leveraged across geopolitical boundaries, (ii) available for leverage, or (iii) desirable to be made available through a hosted “app store” or “cloud” environment;

2. Develop an information clearinghouse for information technology-related data, information, best practices, and sample contracting vehicles that may be accessed by local government IT professionals;

3. Determine which applications would provide the greatest value by being placed on a statewide contract vehicle;

4. Explore opportunities for enterprise application or service deployment, including disaster recovery/back-up; and

5. Investigate partnership opportunities with the Internet2 Open Cloud Experiment project to evaluate priorities and solutions related to disaster recovery and on-demand computing resources for universities.

The Secretary of Technology shall consult with the Virginia Municipal League, the Virginia Association of Counties, the Virginia Association of Local Government Information Technology Executives, and private sector information technology leaders during the course of the study.

All agencies of the Commonwealth shall provide assistance to the Secretary of Technology for this study, upon request.

The Secretary of Technology shall complete its meetings by November 30, 2011, and shall submit to the Governor and the General Assembly an executive summary and a report of its findings and recommendations for publication as a House or Senate document. The executive summary and report shall be submitted as provided in the procedures of the Division of Legislative Automated Systems for the processing of legislative documents and reports no later than the first day of the 2012 Regular Session of the General Assembly and shall be posted on the General Assembly's website.