The delay in converting the offices of County Clerk Katie Lang and Precinct 4 Magistrate Dove Gillam to Tyler Odyssey software cost the county more than it originally thought.
An additional $152,324 was paid on top of the $220,750 paid a few weeks earlier, depleting the county’s contract services account.
The additional cost is for continued support of NetData, a software program that continues to be used in these offices until the conversion to Tyler is complete.
Lang and Gillam called off the office conversion because, according to them, it was too difficult and taxing.
They later agreed to complete the switchover, but by then a Tyler Technologies representative said it would no longer be possible for these offices to operate simultaneously with other offices.
Splitting the conversion into two phases resulted in an unexpected charge of $220,750. According to Tyler, this represents his 1,250 additional hours of work.
County Comptroller Becky Kidd said at the Commissioner’s Court regular meeting on December 13 that NetData did not intend to prorate the fees and insisted on a lump sum payment.
Payment must be made by December 31st or service will be interrupted.
Kidd said he has a check ready to send with funds deducted from the IT department’s budget.
But she said she hopes Lang and the Commissioner’s Court will agree to replace the IT department’s funding with funds from Fund 68, Lang’s records preservation fund. That fund has accumulated at a rate of approximately $350,000 annually and currently contains approximately $1.6 million.
Kidd further said that the use of Fund 68 in software is legal.
“Well, I’m not going to take your word for it,” Lang said. “I’ll look it up.”
During a brief discussion, Lang said he didn’t want to agree to anything at that moment.
“This is the first time I’ve heard of this,” she said. “I was not approached or contacted in court. This came to me in court here.”
Kidd said the issue came up “very late” in the previous week. The commissioner’s court meeting was held on Tuesday.
The court voted 4 to 1 to approve payment of the bill, requiring Lang and Kidd to cooperate on the Fund 68 issue.
District 4 Commissioner Dave Eagle voted against.
