LISBON — Lisbon is looking to hire someone to help speed along the installation of its expensive new software system.
Town officials were led to believe that when they bought the system that a previous finance director would be able to install it, but that has proven to be too much work for one person.
“There’s been a lot of positive things this month with the (accounts payable) portion of it coming on board that we’re seeing a lot of people are liking,” said Finance Director Lydia Colston. “Department heads have their budgets more readily available to them in an easier to understand format.”
Colston has been working on installation along with her daily responsibilities as finance director. On Tuesday, town councilors approved adding a 40-hour per week temporary position for a year, budgeted at $41,600. The position will take care of the bookkeeping and other responsibilities, allowing Colston to stay on track with installing the software.
The system is used in all of the town’s government operations, ranging from financial record keeping and business licensing to utility and tax billing. With one portion done, it’s expected payroll and licensing services will be ready by Jan. 1 with utility and tax billing ready by July 2019.
“By having us bring on this bring on this person, it will allow them to do the day-to-day operations,” said councilor Norm Albert. “The kicker here is we’re going from one system into the new system so there’s going to be fact checking along the way to make sure the data that’s going in is good data.”
Colston expects a smooth and on-time transition for the next two software segments.
Funds for the position will come from money set aside by the council in June when an outside firm was hired for $4,400 to determine how close Lisbon was to completing the installation. There’s a sense of urgency for town officials to get the work complete, as Lisbon is in the second year of a $638,000 contract with MUNIS. Colston believes this is the best solution to ensure the job is done, as she’s the only one with the qualifications to install the software.
“I went back and forth between someone to do the MUNIS implementation versus the bookkeeping,” said Colston. “I think it will be easier to get a bookkeeper, versus someone that has the technical and accounting background to be able to do the implementation.”
Help with software issues doesn’t come cheap. The council had originally set aside a total of $75,000 at the time of June’s assessment with the thought that it could go towards adding help. However, estimates for the technical help to install the software came in much higher, with $186,000 being the cheapest option.
Councilors voted 7-0 to approve the temporary position from the funds previously set aside.
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