Parish President Jason Bergeron lays out goals for his term, and explains last two months
The Terrebonne Parish President who campaigned on "moving Terrebonne Forward' has spent the first two months upgrading the Parish's tech.
Parish President Jason Bergeron said he intends to focus on four goals throughout his term in office: quality of life, infrastructure, diversifying the economy, and good government. Towards this end, he has asked the Terrebonne Parish Council to increase his discretionary spending from $30,000 to $60,000 at the next council meeting, March 13. Currently, any spending by the government under $30,000 does not need approval from the council. If approved, that amount would increase to $60,000.
Infrastructure
The increase in spending, Communications Director Robbie Lee said, is primarily to allow the parish to upgrade its tech infrastructure. According to Lee, the parish government has been paying for old physical tech and newer digital tech, but never fully committed to one or the other. The older tech is out of date now and actually causing problems, so this administration wants to go all in on cloud technology.
The Houma Courier/Thibodaux Daily Comet was taken to areas that housed the servers, and Network Administrator Brian Rodrigue explained how the equipment worked. The large boxes had dsl cables running through each port, and Rodrigue said if any were bumped, the internet for the entire floor of the government would go out. He would then have to go through each cable like Christmas lights to find out which one was acting up and then reconnect everyone else.
"If you touch one of those cables it's going to knock people off and then I've got to figure out what cable and where it is," he said.
The process has taken three to four hours and during that time other employees cannot work.
Near to the box was an upright rectangular collection of cables, which he explained was the physical phone system for the government. This too was set to be removed because it was out of date, 15 to 20 years old. Going through the phones, he found numerous phone lines that were being paid for but were simply unused. This has led to some cost savings for the parish.
To remove the phone line technology, the network boxes will have to be upgraded - eight in total. That means increasing each box's size and their ports. These would remain in the government tower, but go wireless. It will cost roughly $48,000. Rodrigue explained that if the purchase is under the discretionary limit, he can go out and get quotes from multiple companies to find the best deal.
As soon as it exceeds $30,000 it has to go before the council for an open bid. This means the requested technology cannot be as specific, and companies have more control over what is offered and the parish must accept the lowest bid, whatever it may be.
"And I don't control it at that point," Rodrigue said.
He said the cheapest isn't always the best, sometimes it's worth the extra cost, and state contracting prices can also elevate the proposed bids.
The parish also has multiple physical servers in an unmarked building that maintains all the virtual storage of the parish government. These servers are old, and the administration would like to move them to Microsoft's cloud storage. By moving the storage to Microsoft's cloud technology the parish would no longer need to maintain their physical servers, and they wouldn't have to spend money on insurance for the infrastructure. It would be protected by Microsoft's insurance, which Bergeron said would save the parish thousands.
Bergeron said the money has already been budgeted, he just wants to expedite the process of moving the parish to the new technology. He said the council would still have oversight on how the money is spent, through their budgeting, this would just remove some red tape to get it done on his end.
"We're not spending anything outside of budget and if we want to change how something is spent we'd have to do a budget amendment," he explained. "But if something is budgeted for, like $100,000 for software to make sure that we don't get hacked, that will save us millions of dollars, and I've got to wait two weeks to go to the council to get that approved and in that two week time period we get hacked, that costs us $2 million, I just missed an opportunity."
On the roads and bridges side of infrastructure, according to Bergeron, he has been in talks with the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development about making Terrebonne and Lafourche their own district. Currently, the two parishes are lumped in with New Orleans, and Bergeron said that often makes it difficult to secure funds for projects.
"Right now we probably have 70% of the grass, and 30% of the grass-cutting budget," Bergeron said. "We get the scraps, we get what's leftover."
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Diversifying the Economy
The Terrebonne Parish Government is going through a rebranding, similar to what Lafourche Parish did while Lee was there. The old logo will be reserved for governmental purposes, and a new logo will be created for marketing purposes. The goal is to use the new brand to attract businesses and tourism to the area.
Currently, there is an ordinance that restricts usage of the parish seal and carries a fine of up to $500 for its misuse. Bergeron will ask the Parish Council to rescind portions of the ordinance carrying the fine, and the necessity to seek approval.
"We believe it should be used, it is a seal for the people, it is not a seal for the government," he said.
The new brand will be copyrighted, Lee said, to avoid others using the logo to imitate the government.
Bergeron said he is also seeking a grassroots way to diversify the economy by creating tech opportunities for teens. He is looking for ways to add STEM programs to high schools that lead to tech mentorship programs at Fletcher Community College. Tech opportunities for children are important to him, he said, because technology led to his success.
"As a kid, I grew up in a trailer, don't have a college education, computers have gotten me to the success I have today," he said. "How many other kids are like that in our community?"
He said he is hoping that children who learn technology here could lead to the next innovations in the shrimping, fishing, and energy sectors.
Quality of Life
The Terrebonne Parish Government isn't the only entity being rebranded, so is the Terrebonne Parish Recreation. Bergeron said the old name makes it sound like recreation is only for children, and he wants to encourage all Terrebonne residents to use the services on offer.
Quality of Life Director Jim Wendell said the department has put many of the parks, gyms, and other services under one roof with the goal of making a "one stop shop," for residents to utilize. According to Lee, the department is working to bring more recreation opportunities for people of all ages, such as the Silver Slippers programs.
"Not just recreation for kids, recreational opportunities for everybody," he said.
Better Government
According to Bergeron, he wants to better inform the public of what the government is doing, how to get involved, and how residents can utilize what resources the government has to offer.
The Quality of Life department is one step in this process, but another example is that the parish will soon have a new website available. Lee, and his two other employees, are creating it, and he said he expects it to be revealed in the next three months. The goal is to make it more user-friendly and navigable.
Bergeron has also begun a process in his administration where employees will have a quarterly evaluation with their superiors to discuss successes and where improvements can be had. This is conducted with the goal of one-on-one communication and sharing ideas, he said.
"It's opening lines of communication so that people can speak freely," he said. "To speak freely about things you want to improve without any fear of retribution."
This article originally appeared on The Courier: Parish President Jason Bergeron lays out goals for his term
