Here comes City Clerk Sandra Kennedy, blazing a trail into 21st century technology with blinding speed:
Sandra Kennedy, who has held the city clerk's office since 1983, on Wednesday announced a plan to replace stacks of paper with tablet computers for council members; stream meetings live on the Web; and provide easier mobile access to agendas, ordinances and other council documents.
“It'll be nice to see this iPad around the table, and not a stack of paper,” said Kennedy, a Democrat, adding that the “paperless” initiative could save her office $10,000 a year in supplies and administrative costs.
Each of council's nine members will get an Apple iPad at a cost of $499 each, said Jim Haley, information technology director with the city. Haley said the most basic model of the tablet computer fit council's needs.
Well, not really. People have been trying to push Kennedy into being more innovative and technologically savvy for years, but she wasn't having any of it. Her Republican opponent in this year's election thinks he knows why she's suddenly so hot to modernize:
Kennedy's Republican challenger in the November election, Zach Bonahoom, has made technology and efficiency the focus of his campaign
Comments
Maybe Kennedy can hire Zach to show her how to use the ipads.
Zach is a bit immature. He is acting like a school kid- "someone copied my paper!"
He also said iPads were not the way to go, since the city uses Windows based systems. I wonder if Brian Bosma and David Long agree- the legislature is getting ready to buy iPads for each member.......
Clerk Kennedy is a very nice person, but as far as technological sophistication is concerned she is waaaay behind the curve. The specific type of device to be used is irrelevant to the fact that she probably never would have
Phil- Sandy has been working on this concept BEFORE Zach put it on his webpage. PERIOD.
Second- You trust Zach to determine if the iPad is the right device? Fine. Please call State Senator David Long and House Speaker Brian Bosma and tell them "Zach Bonahoom says you are buying the wrong devices for your members"
Kevin,
There are two things that I highly respect about you. First of all, you are very intelligent. Your ability and willingness to break issues down into the minor details and put those details back together to make your point is, at times, impressive. You may recall from some of our previous discussions that you have turned my opinion on some matters because of this.
I also appreciate that you are willing to step outside of your comfort zone. A Democratic opinion is always guaranteed a warm reception on your Watchdog and other left-leaning sites, but you never shy away from the right leaning sites such as this one. No one is ever going to learn anything if we all just talk to the mirror and get an automatic pat on the back.
So you
Phil, don't hold your breath on a reply from Kevin on that one.
*crickets*