"Innovation through Partnership"

The City of Wichita IT department functions as an internal service fund, that is, we operate as an internal business supplying technical solutions to all departments. IT contributes to an efficient and productive City government while using modern information technologies to improve citizen access to government information and services. To give focus and direction to staff within the department and to help plan for the future, an overall mission has been established together with seven goals. We strive to maximize the use of existing technologies and are mindful of future impact when developing or acquiring new systems. If you have any questions about IT, please let us know.

Goals

1. Provide vision, leadership, and a framework for evaluating emerging technologies and implementing proven information technology solutions.
2. Provide citizens, the business community and City staff with convenient access to appropriate information and services through technology. 
3. Partner with City departments to improve business operations by understanding business needs and by planning, implementing and managing innovative technology solutions. 
4. Guarantee a reliable communication and computer infrastructure foundation on which to efficiently conduct City business operations today and in the future at competitive benchmarked rates.
5. Effectively communicate information about plans, projects, and achievements to City staff and customers. 
6. Develop and maintain technically skilled staff that is competent in current and emerging information technology and a user community that understands and can employ modern technologies to maximize business benefits. 
7. Ensure effective technical and fiscal management of the Department's operations, resources, technology projects and contracts.

Ten Principles of IT

In addition to the Department of Information Technology's goals, Information Technology (IT) projects and processes will be guided by ten fundamental principles.

1.      Our ultimate goal is to provide citizens, the business community, and city employees with timely, convenient access to appropriate information and services through the use of information technology.

2.      Business needs drive information technology solutions.  Strategic partnerships will be established between the stakeholders and the IT department so that the benefits of technology maximize the productivity of city employees and improve customer services.

3.      Evaluate business processes in partnership with departments for redesign opportunities before automating them.  Use new technologies to make new business methods a reality.  Exploit functional commonality across organizational boundaries.

4.      Manage Information Technology as an investment.

a.      Annually allocate funds sufficient to replace systems and equipment before end of life.  Address project and infrastructure requirements through a multi-year planning and funding strategy.

b.      Manage spending efficiently across the investment portfolio.

c.       Look for cost-effective approaches to improving legacy systems.  Designate systems as "retired" where appropriate and plan their modernization.  This approach will help extend investments and system utility.

d.      Invest in education and training so that technical staff in central IT and in user departments understand and can use current and future technologies.

5.      Implement contemporary, but proven, technologies.  The City of Wichita will stay abreast of emerging trends through an ongoing program of technology evaluation.  New technologies will be introduced through pilot projects where both the automation and its business benefits and cost can be evaluated prior to full-scale adoption.

6.      Hardware and software shall adhere to vendor-independent standards and shall aim to minimize proprietary solutions.  This approach promotes flexibility, inter-operability, cost effectiveness, and mitigates the risk of dependence upon individual vendors.

7.      Provide a solid technology infrastructure as the fundamental building block of the city's IT architecture to reliably support the performance and security of the city’s information assets.  Manage and maintain the enterprise network as an essential communications channel connecting people to information.  Use contemporary server platforms and workstations to provide computing resources.  Access for both internal and external connectivity, will be flexible, expandable, maintainable; fully integrated, and use open standards.  Additionally it will move data, graphics, image, video, and voice unimpeded.

8.      Approach IT undertakings as a partnership of central management with departments providing a combination of centralized and distributed implementation.  Combine the responsibility and knowledge of central management, department staff, as well as outside contract support, within a consistent framework of city IT architecture and standards.  Establish strategic cooperative arrangements among public and private enterprises to extend limited resources.

9.      Consider the purchase and integration of top quality, commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) software  requiring minimal customization as the first choice to speed the delivery of new business applications.  This will require IT and department collaboration on identifying, investigating and redesigning existing work processes to be compatible with common practices. Because certain departments operate under business practices established in response to specific local interpretations and constraints, the institutionalization of these common business practices may make the acquisition of COTS software infeasible.  IT will develop applications using modern, efficient methods and labor saving tools in a collaborative application development environment following architectural framework and standards.  Information architecture supported by a repository for common information (e.g., databases, files, records, methods, application inventories) repeatable processes and infrastructures will be created, shared and reused.

10.  Capture data only once in order to avoid cost, duplication of effort and the potential for error; share the data whenever possible.  Establish and use common data and common databases fully.  Consider the establishment of a data administration function to be responsible for establishing and enforcing data policy, data sharing and access, data standardization, data quality, identification and consistent use of key corporate identifiers.

Our Workgroups

Administration
This work group oversees the management of the IT department. Several performance measures including cost per PC are utilized in determining the efficiency and effectiveness of IT services.  In addition, they oversee the financial solvency of the department by paying the bills and administering the internal charge back system.

GIS Applications
The GIS Applications group develops and updates GIS data layers for use in nearly every City field operation, including Police (GeoCrime), Planning (GeoZone), Water and Sewer (GeoFlow), Public Works (GeoWorks), Fire (GeoMap) and the Office of Central Inspection (GeoZone). GIS also coordinates data sharing with Sedgwick County, providing weekly updates to the City GIS databases so that users have the most up-to-date information.

Help Desk & Telephony
The Help Desk responds to staff needs and ensures supported software and hardware, including PCs, laptops, thin clients and peripherals are available and functioning properly. Help Desk’s performance strategies include: 1) each analyst has a specialization, rather than all analysts trying to know all things, 2) utilize new technology to create efficiencies where possible such as remote assistance 3) staffing phones during business hours with at least two analysts , 4) setting and implementing standards for desktop hardware and software to ensure a supportable computing environment, 5) analysts training in hardware and software is kept current to ensure they can help when called, and 6) seek to maintain 1 Help Desk Analyst per 400 PCs (both phone and desk side) so that calls will be answered in a timely manner.

Internet Technology/Application Development
This work group develops and maintains the City Web Site, all internal web-based applications, Intranet, internally developed applications and all associated infrastructure. The group also searches for e-commerce opportunities and supports departments that do business electronically. They develop internal applications requested by departments and develop and maintain e-government strategies.

Application Support
The Application Support group is tasked with optimizing software systems for use by City departments, and leading application upgrade/update projects. Application Support seeks to minimize the down time and maximize the usefulness of the software the departments use through support staff training, software selection, and software updates. Like the applications, down time is a priority that is addressed through updated and maintained systems and trained staff.

IT Operations (Network)
IT/IS Operations is responsible for all IT hardware and network equipment, and maintaining the security and integrity of the Citywide network. Network downtime debilitates many City functions, and thus is a performance measure. Operations seeks to minimize this by: 1) protecting the network from external corruption through monitoring tools, 2) upgrading the network when feasible, and 3) timing upgrades in off business hours.

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