Oakland County commissioners approved a cooperative purchase of OpenGov's strategic sourcing and contract lifecycle management modules during the Dec. 3 Finance Committee meeting.

Procurement staff described a multi-platform workflow that currently moves solicitations from Workday to Office 365 to BidNet Direct and back manually. The OpenGov platform would allow departments to enter requisitions in Workday, push solicitations and evaluation templates through OpenGov, and return contract records to l-forms and Workday for purchase orders and financials. Staff said OpenGov is FOIA-friendly, integrates with DocuSign, and would centralize contract templates, evaluations and contract lifecycle records. Implementation was characterized as a six-month process with four months of training for end users.

Commissioners asked why the item was labeled an "exception" to purchasing policy; staff said the purchase uses a cooperative procurement and requires reappropriation of funds. Procurement and parks staff agreed the county would train and coordinate with county purchasing to ensure policy compliance during implementation. The motion to approve the purchase and appropriation carried.