City Council Meeting: September
26, 2006
Agenda Item: 1-D
To: Mayor and City Council
From: Jory Wolf, Chief Information
Officer
Subject: Authorize the Purchasing Agent to
Issue a Purchase Order for a Digital Storage System.
Recommended
Action
It is recommended that the City Council
authorize the Purchasing Agent to issue a purchase order to Nth Generation
Computing, Inc. for a digital storage system for video taken by cameras
installed in the jail of the Public Safety Facility.
Executive
Summary
The jail in the
Public Safety Facility is equipped with cameras that monitor and record
interaction between staff and inmates.
Video from cameras is presently recorded on an analog time lapse video
cassette recording system. The analog
system has proven to be unreliable and should be replaced with a digital
system. The digital system requires high
capacity digital storage technology to store the video captured by the
cameras. The total cost of the digital
storage system is $249,435, including tax and three years of maintenance. Funding for this purchase is included in the
adopted budget for FY 2006-07.
Background
The analog video recording system in the jail records time lapse
video onto video cassettes. The system
has proven to be unreliable and should be replaced with a digital system. Digital based recording systems are designed
with redundancy which enables a greater level of reliability and performance
over analog systems. Digital storage
systems are easier to manage, provide a greater level of security while
enabling shared access, require less physical storage and facilitate faster
reproduction for response to discovery motions.
Until now, digital storage systems were cost prohibitive. Recent advances in technology have reduced
the total cost of ownership of digital storage systems now making them an
affordable alternative to analog systems.
Vendor Selection
In June 2006, a Request for Proposals seeking qualified vendors to
furnish and install a digital storage system was published. Five proposals were received, and an
evaluation committee reviewed and ranked the proposals. Factors such as reliability, redundancy,
compatibility with the digital recording equipment and software, and total cost
were taken into consideration while evaluating proposals. The Hewlett Packard EVA8000 system proposed
by Nth Generation Computing, Inc. was chosen as the best system for the City’s
needs. The Hewlett Packard EVA8000 is
fully compatible with the digital recording equipment, and offers a highly
redundant, reliable, and expandable architecture combined with competitive
pricing.
Budget/Financial Impact
Funding
for the purchase of the digital storage system, including three years of
maintenance, is available in the following accounts:
$205,955 - C010830.589000
$43,480 - C010058.589000
Funds
for maintenance after the first three years will be provided in the Police
Department’s annual budgets.
Prepared by:
|
Approved: |
|
Forwarded to Council: |
|
|
|
|
|
Jory Wolf Chief
Information Officer |
|
P. City Manager |