A staff-led evaluation team recommended that Freestone County replace its aging NetData system with a Texas-based, county-focused cloud software suite (referred to in the package as LGS/Financial Intelligence), a presenter told the commissioners.

The presentation, delivered by Speaker 5, said the system would centralize payroll, treasurer, auditor and other departmental functions in a single hosted platform and would allow department heads and commissioners to view budgets and expenditures online. "It's cloud based software," Speaker 5 said when describing hosting and indexing features. The vendor also offers automated scanning that it says will index documents into the correct records folder.

Why it matters: the county's current system was described as "antiquated" in the presentation, and staff said a modern system could increase efficiency across offices and reduce long-term labor costs as the county grows. The team said the new platform could let commissioners and department heads view budgets in real time and support a move toward a largely paperless process for routine requests and approvals.

Key details discussed: the current written quote in the packet showed an annual licensing/hosting cost estimate of $38,700 for the number of users discussed. Speaker 5 flagged several implementation costs: data extraction from the old system (noted in the presentation as roughly $7,500 per extraction in prior migrations), a potential $5,000 mapping fee to ensure the new general ledger is configured correctly, travel and training expenses (several days on-site for vendor implementation), and hosting fees (a $25,000 hosting figure was shown on an internal cost sheet for certain items). Speaker 5 also noted the vendor's typical implementation timeline: begin building in April and go live in September if scheduling allows.

Commissioners and department staff asked about interactions with the county's Time Clock Plus contract and whether the new vendor would integrate that functionality. Speaker 5 said the new system includes payroll but would not integrate Time Clock Plus; the county could either keep the current time-clock vendor or move to the vendor's native timekeeping option when existing Time Clock Plus contract renewal considerations arise.

Staff emphasized auditability: the county auditor will be given a sandbox account to review general-ledger structure before full implementation. Speaker 5 cautioned that once a general ledger is mapped and loaded, reversing the structure is difficult: "You only get one shot at it," they said, urging consideration of the $5,000 mapping step to avoid long-term problems.

Next steps: commissioners recorded a motion and second on proceeding with the vendor recommendation and asked staff to continue due diligence, including auditor review and finalizing exact cost allocations for the coming fiscal year.