MUNICIPALITY OF NORRISTOWN. Responses to Proposal Questions

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1 Q: What are the pain points being experienced with the current IT setup? A: Age of the equipment, reliability of service, no redundancy for internet service. Q: How is technology managed today? A: Outsourced to a 3 rd party IT consultant. There is no internal IT support staff. Q: How are issues tracked? A: Online ticket incident management system with the 3 rd party IT consultant. Q: When an employee has a technology issue, what do they do? A: Submit a help request via and a ticket number is assigned by the IT consultant. Q: Do you engage a 3 rd party consultant? Q: If so, how long does it normally take for technology issues to be resolved? A: Most tickets are resolved within 5-7 business days. Q: What limitations do they have? A: Purchase authorization limit of $500 per item without additional authorizations. Projects and software changes must be approved by Administration. Q: Is support for required 24/7 remote, on-site or both? A: Remote support for would be sufficient for 24/7 IT needs after standard business operating hours; and further assessment of the issue would determine if there is a need for an on-site visit. Q: Besides the main location (235 East Airy Street, Norristown, PA 19401), are there any other locations that will require IT support? A: The Municipality has four (4) offsite firehouses (not owned by the Municipality) with a Municipal staff presence. The Municipality also has the Recreation department located offsite. 1 P age

2 Q: Of the staff members, how many employees will require IT Support (i.e. computer and phone)? A: There are approximately 80 users; however, there are approximately 25 devices that are not assigned to individuals (i.e. Police Car laptops) that will require support. Q: How many total active computers are there on the network today? A: Approximate Approximately 75 desktops, 35 laptops and 30 tablets. Q: What are the age, make, and model of these computers? A: The majority of desktop machines are either Lenovo or Dell and most are less than more than 5 years old. Q: Are there laptops in the environment? Q: If so, how many? A: Approximately 35 devices. Q: What are the age, make, and model of these computers? A: The majority are laptops are either Lenovo or Dell, in addition to three (3) Microsoft Surface machines and one (1) Apple machine. The age of most of the devices are more than 5 years old. Q: Does Municipality of Norristown intend to have the awarded vendor provide new computers as part of the service agreement? A: No, specs would be developed with the assistance of the selected provider, however, hardware would be purchased under procurement policy procedures. Q: Does any staff work remotely? Q: If so, how many and how often? A: The firehouses connect through VPN daily and two (2) executive level staff have VPN access and use it as needed. 2 P age

3 Q: Please explain the functions of these staff members and what they need access to. A: Staff working remotely require access to Microsoft Office, , files stored on the service and server based/internet based departmental software. Q: Is there a local server infrastructure today? Q: If so, how many? A: Thirteen (13) servers. Q: What are the age, make, and model/s of the server/s? A: Models include IBM, VM Ware, HP Proliant and Dell Poweredge, and the age of the equipment is between one (1) and seven (7) year old. Q: What applications are served from this today? A: Finance, Real Estate Taxes, Parking, Exchange, Public Safety, etc. Q: Are any applications hosted in the Cloud? Q: If so, what applications? A: Payroll, Firehouse inventory management and GIS applications. Q: How is the access to these server/s and application/s? A: Access is generally reliable. Q: What is Municipality of Norristown s platform (i.e. Microsoft Exchange)? A: Microsoft Exchange. Q: Is the hosted locally or in the Cloud? A: Hosted locally. Q: Does Municipality of Norristown have continuity? A: No. 3 P age

4 Q: Does Municipality of Norristown archive every sent and received ? Q: If so, for how long? A: In perpetuity. Q: Is being backed up? Q: Has Municipality of Norristown ever had to undergo an ediscovery? Q: What type of phone system is currently in place? A: Mitel digital platform. Q: How many active telephone extensions? Approximately 80 desktop phones. Q: What is the age, make, and model of the phone system? A: The equipment model is Inter Tel digital platform phones and they are over 5 years old. Q: Will Municipality of Norristown consider a replacement telephony platform? Q: Can Municipality of Norristown provide a copy of the phone bill? A: Phone bills will be provided as part of the discovery process for the proposers selected for interviews and site tours. Q: Are there currently any issues with the current platform? Q: If so, can you please describe? A: Issues include system outages, insufficient support for troubleshooting, etc. 4 P age

5 Q: Who is the current Internet Service Provider (ISP)? A: Broadview. Q: What are the speeds of the internet connection/s? A: Approx 28 mbps. Q: Is there an annual contract? Q: How has the performance been? A: Internet outages have been experienced. Q: How is Municipality of Norristown backing up its server and desktop infrastructure? A: Backups are performed by the outsourced IT Consultant. Q: Does Municipality of Norristown have an offsite backup solution for the data? Q: If so, please explain. A: There is an offsite backup solution in place managed by the outsourced IT service provider. Q: Has Municipality of Norristown ever had to recover data from an event? Q: If so, can you please explain? A: To restore system software access. Q: If the power goes out, or access to the servers becomes unavailable, how does Municipality of Norristown handle this? A: If power goes out, there is an onsite generator to supply auxiliary power. Q: Has Municipality of Norristown experienced downtime in the past year? 5 P age

6 Q: If so, how much downtime? A: Several days. Q: Please explain. A: Connection to internet service provider lost and unable to be re-established for several days. Q: Do users save data to their desktops? Q: If so, are the desktops being backed up? A: Yes Q: Please explain. A: Desktops connected to the server are backed up nightly. Q: Have you ever calculated how much money every hour of unscheduled downtime is costing Municipality of Norristown? A: No. Q: What technology vendors do you work with? (i.e. internet provider, phone provider, copier/print company, software companies. A: Comcast, Broadview, Verizon, Konica Minolta, Canon, Microsoft, HP, Apple, etc.; additional details would be provided to the proposers selected for interviews and site visits. Q: What are you using to filter your internet? A: Firewalls and other protective software solutions. Q: Do you like the solution? A: It is difficult to judge because it is an automatic solutions that does not require user interface. Q: Are you currently under contract for this solution? Q: Is the solution user friendly? A: It does not generally require user interface. 6 P age

7 Q: Do you give your staff free roam when web surfing for appropriate content? Q: Please explan. A: There is no specific policy for this practice. Access to sites with Inappropriate content are blocked using the security filter. Q: Are you worried about student/staff productivity due to the internet? Q: Is SPAM an issue? Q: If so, please explain. A: has a high filter in most cases, but there are some items that are able to get through. Q: Have you ever had a virus outbreak on the network Q: Please explain. A: A virus was introduced through user error and detected by the virus protection software. Q: How did you resolve it? A: Once the issue was identified, corrective measures are taken by the IT consultant. Q: How long did it take to remediate? A: It takes between one and several days, depending on the severity and might result in a loss of productivity because access to the device is not available. Q: Can you provide us with the details on the existing telephone system? A: Mitel Inter-Tel digital platform desk phones. Q: What are the specifications for the new telephony system? A: The specifications have not been determined and will be developed with the assistance of the selected proposer. There are approximately 80 desk phone lines. Q: Due to telephony features such as VOIP mobile phone tethering and emerging technology where mobile phones are now being used in Access Control Systems, is the assessment to include the Municipality s wireless phone carriers and devices? A: Yes, mobile phone service should be considered in the telephony plan. 7 P age

8 Q: What is the quantity of mobile devices? A: There are approximately 80 mobile phones and 20 hot spot devices. It is intended that the hot spot devices would be transitioned to devices (tablets) with internal WiFi. Q: What is the current mobile device platform? A: The Municipality currently has several agreements which include multiple carriers (Verizon, ATT& and Sprint). Most devices are smart phones. Q: For the security assessment of the data lines entering the facility, would it be permissible to execute a non-invasive penetration test of public-facing IT systems? A: The opportunity to perform these test would be offered as part of the discovery process for the proposers selected for interviews and site tours. Q: Will or should this assessment include any evaluation of telecommunications systems external to the main facility such as the fire house? A: The evaluation would be limited to the main site. Q: If so, would it be permissible to perform penetration testing as described above at the remote locations? A: Not applicable. Q: Does the Municipality have a preference as to whether the VOIP system would be hosted offsite or onsite? A: That would be determined once the benefits and costs are considered. Q: If the Municipality prefers onsite VOIP, would it also prefer to self-administer the system, or is it preferable to have this function outsourced by the firm awarded the contract? A: There are no IT professionals on site, so whether the system is on-site or off-site, it would be managed by the firm(s) awarded the contract? Q: Currently the Municipality outsources the phone system to a hosted phone system provider. Would the Municipality consider keeping the system hosted but having a new vender assist with escalation with the provider? A: That would be determined based on the options available and the overall telephony plan. 8 P age

9 Q: Is it the goal to have the phone system brought on premises? A: The goal to have the phone system on premises or off premises would be determined by the overall telephony plan and other contributing factors (i.e. cost, impact on system changes and infrastructure, etc.) Q: Is the Municipality planning on providing a PM to host all customer project progress con call, take minutes, coordinate findings/analysis/recommendation, etc. efforts for customer delivery or should a PM be included in the proposal from the vendor. A: The PM should be included in the proposal from the vendor. Q: There are many security compliance standards published. Which standards is Municipality requiring and which standards are considered preferred. A: The security compliance standards would be considered based on the security requirements of each operating component of the Municipality. 9 P age