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| President’s Message – Sid Hudson |
Hello to all TAGITM’ers.
It has been a while, but I hope everyone had blessed holidays and a wonderful New Year’s. Last week the Board and the Education Committee met in person in Waco to start the finalization of the Conference Theme, Speakers and Education sessions that I am sure you will enjoy at the upcoming conference. Thanks to all the committees that have worked hard this year to improve and expand the TAGITM organization. We have a very bright future ahead!
We are headed to The Woodlands for our conference this year, and I am being told the hotel and conference area is extremely nice. There is also golf on the agenda for Tuesday and I am sure the course is exceptional as William Pham our Secretary Treasurer is a member there. Should be a fun morning with pre-conference sessions shortly after we come off the course.
One other exciting note is we had a goal to have a Regional Summit in Arkansas this year. This has gained a lot of momentum over the past few weeks and I am hopeful we will have our first out of state Summit in June 2019. Some of you may remember Keith Macedo who is in Fayetteville, Arkansas and he has been instrumental in us bringing an event to that state.
As a reminder, we continue to provide access to the GMIS Data Dive and that organization has worked to refine the data entry needed to get to the data we want to see. The information for the improved data input model is now complete, so I would encourage you to input your data and pull some reports that can help you in multiple ways. These reports may help you justify FTE’s or projects in your upcoming budgets. Additionally, your City Manager may ask you questions and this data may be beneficial in assisting you to provide answers. We are at a decision point with the GMIS data drive and if we do not see more participation from the TAGITM membership, there will no longer be justification for spending the organization’s budget on this benefit.
Marketing efforts continue with a marketing firm that is executing a plan in an effort to increase and achieve our membership goals. The membership goal for the year 2020 is 270 total member agencies.
I am looking forward to seeing all of you at the conference this year as this is the only time we get to see many of our fellow members since we are spread across this great state.
Have a great rest of your week - see you soon.
Sid Hudson
Chief Information Officer
City of McKinney
President, 2018-2019 |
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| February 2019 Marketing Committee Update |
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The TAGITM Marketing Committee focused heavily on increasing our social media presence, as well as marketing of our regional groups and events, and the 40th Anniversary of our organization along with the Annual Education Conference.
In 2017, we started with… 2 Facebook followers, 138 members in a private LinkedIn Group, No LinkedIn Page, 39 followers on Twitter and no Instagram presence. We did not use social media to promote events or regional groups or events. The Annual Education Conference was our only focus.
Throughout 2018… we promoted our regional groups and events, the Annual Education Conference, and revamped our social media presence. We published updates more regularly on our social media accounts, created a LinkedIn page (April 2018) and Instagram account (November 2018).
Now, in 2019… Our social media presence has grown substantially over the past year. We now have 108 Facebook followers, 130 followers of our new LinkedIn page, 133 followers on Twitter, and 5 followers on Instagram.
What to expect for 2019
- Another strong conference promotion campaign
- Sustained Regional Focus
- Video Elements
We still need your help. Social media works best when our members like, follow, and share our posts. You can also share your own TAGITM-related posts and tag our organization and use the #TAGITM hashtag. Find us online at the links below:
https://www.instagram.com/tagitm/ @tagitm
https://twitter.com/tagitm @tagitm
https://www.linkedin.com/company/tagitm/
https://www.facebook.com/TAGITM
https://www.youtube.com/user/tagitmorg
Jason Power
Marketing Chair, 2018-2019 |
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| Membership Renewals |
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Don't let your TAGITM membership lapse! The TAGITM Membership year is October 1 through September 30. If you haven’t already renewed or your membership expired, don’t worry as there is still time to gain access to:
- TAGITM Member Resources, our document repository available through the web site
- TAGITM Member Listserv to collaborate and discuss today's hottest trends and issues
- TAGITM Director Listserv for those at the Executive Management Level
- Regional Member Groups and networking opportunities
- Continued learning at discounted rates through webinars, regional events and conference presentations
In order to renew your membership you will need the User Name and Password for the Agency/Organization Member profile. If you do not have this login information, you may contact info@tagitm.org for assistance. Once you have logged into the Agency/Organization Member profile, click on the "Manage Profile" link in the right-hand navigation, and then scroll down to the bottom of the window and under Account History click on "Membership". You'll see your current expiration date and a link to the current invoice for the 2019 membership year. You may renew your dues online if you are paying by Credit Card or print the current invoice if you are paying by Purchase Order/Invoice.
Please note that the membership voted to increase all membership dues by $25 at the 2018 Annual Business Meeting. The purpose of this increase is to cover increasing costs and expanded programs, such as additional education offerings and access to GMIS Data Dive for members. Agency dues are $175 per year and affiliate dues are now $200 per year. The last dues increase was in 2014 and was dedicated to a membership reserve / rainy day fund.
Thank you,
Kevin Cameron
Membership Chair, 2018-2019
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| RMG Updates |
Happy New Year! Hopefully someone’s New Year’s resolution is to take a leadership role within TAGITM. We are still looking for a Panhandle RMG Chair. Please let me know if you might be interested in the RMG Chair role.
Regional Member Group (RMG) Chairs serve a critical role in the success of the Texas Association of Governmental Information Technology Managers (TAGITM). RMG Chairs must be members of TAGITM and serve in the region in which they reside.
RMG Chair Duties & Responsibilities:
- Promote the association at all appropriate opportunities (i.e. regional programs, networking event, Annual Conference, etc.)
- Establish contact with new and existing members in designated region to recruit membership and regional program/networking event attendance.
- Schedule four networking events per year; research/decide topic and the need thereof and help locate speaker and meeting site
- Attend TAGITM membership committee meetings and other task committees as assigned
Kevin Cameron
Membership Chair, 2018-2019 |
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| Member Spotlight |
 Organization Name:
City of Seguin; population 30k and growing quickly.
Number of IT Workers in the Organization: 8 FT/1 PT.
Significant Technology Achievements:
Spillman Flex/InSight integration from CRIMES; Avigilon Enterprise Video Management platform; Mimecast implementation; Data Center fiber ring expansion; Data Center battery backups; Public Safety handheld radios upgrade; Body cams (WatchGuard); PD Interview rooms upgrade; New Library (43k sq ft/LEED certified/14m); New Utilities Operations Center (51k sq ft/11m); New Animal Services facility (10.6k sq ft/3.5M); Network refresh/redesign; Perimeter security refresh; SCADA virtualization; Electric substation fiber connectivity; Windows 10 implementation; Trail cams in city parks; ERP implementation; EnerGov upgrade; Tyler Courts software upgrade; City IT policy refresh; City wide conference room baseline.
Plans for Future Technology Initiatives:
Radio infrastructure upgrade/migration; New Development Center facility; New water plant facility; Verizon Public Core; Fiber ring buildout; Network refresh continuation; Telecom refresh; Virtual conferencing; Video streaming; Billing audit; Trail cam expansion; Data Center hyperconvergence; Body/Dash cam expansion.
Most Challenging Project:
Network refresh/redesign (Approx. 80 devices) – The city was built on a flat network not capable of scaling to the extent needed and/or predicted over the coming years. Instead of performing a plug and play layer 2/3 refresh on the 7-8 year old infrastructure IT decided to bite the bullet and rearchitect the entire network. Every device with an IP in the city had to be touched. With public safety and multiple revenue generation departments end user impact had to be considered for every step. Quite the headache!
Most Rewarding Project:
Spillman Flex/InSight integration – Specifically the Flex RMS, CAD, Mobile, Mapping, Analytics, Fire and InSight modules from the Spillman suite of products. Impacting public safety is critical to any entity. An excessive amount of preparation went into the effort and on migration day that extra effort paid off as the cutover went about as seamlessly as it possibly could. As anyone with a few major initiatives in their rear view will tell you last minute problems are to be expected and basically the norm. You do the best you can to mitigate potential hurdles through preparation but inevitably something typically comes up. That was not the case with Seguin’s Spillman integration as the city breezed through it over the course of a morning this past September. On top of the internal integration Seguin became the first city to virtually connect to the regional hub in Pflugerville as to allow future agencies that connect in through Spillman InSight hub to share data in real time to the forward deployed public safety personnel in the field.
What is Most Valuable About Being a TAGITM Member:
The easy answer is collaboration; we can pick up the phone and/or email a lot of folks out there and get feedback on any level of nuance we run into. We all have variations of the same problems and there’s always someone out there that’s figured it out no matter how large or small the issue. I value the feedback received from peers and it carries weight in the decisions made on behalf of Seguin.
Personally, in my 20+ years supporting the Feds and private industry around the world I never had the privilege of participating in an organization quite like TAGITM. The way I explain it to non-members is we’re a bunch of good ole boys (and girls) doing amazing things with technology. Case in point how many of you have heard from others how fun the conferences are? We work hard and we play hard! I’m Texas born and bred and to me TAG is the precise organizational representation of what it means to drive collaboration, innovation, and technology the Texas way. I’m proud to work for Seguin and to be a part of TAGITM; I wouldn’t want to do this anywhere else! |
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| Why Should You Use GMIS Data Dive™? |
When William Lyons, Information Technology Director, of Paulding County, Georgia needed to get information on a new Fax Server he used the GMIS Data Dive™ to see what other GMIS membership were using. Not only did William find a new Fax Server that cost less than Paulding County’s existing system, but it was much easier to maintain in-house. Will responded on the GMIS Listserv by saying “I saved thousands just by one search! Thanks to all of you who have responded to the dive!”
If your organization has not already completed the entry of data into the GMIS Data Dive™ Platform, you’re missing an opportunity to have access to great data which can be used to make timely, data-driven decisions based on information from comparable organizations. Don’t delay….enter your organization’s information into the GMIS Data Dive™ today and start taking advantage of this great information.
Several images of sample reports here: https://www.gmis.org/page/DataDiveSampleRpts/GMIS-Data-Dive-Sample-Reports.htm
Jason Power
Marketing Chair, 2018-2019
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| Committee Announcements |
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2019 TAGITM Conference Have you heard?
The 41st Annual Tagitm Education Conference is almost here and is filled with a great line up of keynote speakers and education sessions. One new addition you will find this year is the Innovation track. Like the security track from last year this gives attendees four tacks to choose from when planning out your agenda. From the first day to the last day you will have the opportunity to learn from some industry experts as well as network with your counterparts from all over the state. We will kick off the first day with the ability to work on your golf game, and we have an afternoon training session lined up for people that are interested in learning more about Microsoft Power BI! Tangent and Microsoft are teaming up to bring this opportunity, so sign up quickly before the spots run out! |
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| TAGITM Awards for Excellence Nominations Now Open |
Each year, as we work through special projects in our own cities, they can start to seem like business as usual. However, it is these projects that create efficiencies and drive innovation in the departments that we support. Sometimes, the smallest ones can make the most difference to our users and citizens. Please take a moment and submit a nomination for a project that stood out and let’s recognize the great work that is happening in our agencies!
Do you know a TAGITM member that has exceptional leadership skills? The Rising Star Award recognizes those that have tremendous potential for stepping into leadership positions within their organization. These individuals are great at managing change and are natural innovators. If this sounds like someone you know, nominate them for a TAGITM Rising Star Award!
Take a look at TAGITM.org and navigate to the 2019 Call for Award Nominations page. You can see all the award categories and links to submit nominations.
Tony Gonzalez
Communications Chair, 2018-2019 |
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| Conference Update |
The TAGITM Annual Education Conference will held April 16 - 19, 2019 at The Woodlands Waterway Marriott, The Woodlands, Texas. The TAGITM Conference provides technology education specific to county and city IT Managers and staff. If you are in charge of the technical strategic direction for your county or city or are involved in making technology decisions and recommendations for your municipality, you will want to attend!
The TAGITM Conference Committee delivers an outstanding program. Over 40+ years of leadership, insight and innovation go into the planning of this conference. The conference provides excellent education sessions, opportunities to explore the exhibit hall to learn about new cutting edge technologies and services from some of the industry’s leading providers, and networking with business partners from across the state.. |
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