Brighton Township is moving to a new phone system that will save money and boost efficiency.

The Brighton Township Board of Trustees approved the necessary agreements at a recent meeting. The new system will be installed at the township hall and the wastewater treatment plant. Assistant Township Manager Zach Dyba tells WHMI the current phone system is nearly 20 years old and very outdated in technology years. He says by going to this new system, they’ll be able to switch over to a voice over internet protocol phone system and that will allow phone calls to be made using the existing internet infrastructure. Because of that, Dyba says the township will be able to incur significant financial savings. The e total anticipated cost for the system changeover is roughly $22,000 to $23,000 but those costs will be recouped. Over a five year period, a $45,000 savings is projected, which Dyba says basically pays for the new system in two and a half years. He noted this is one of those rare projects taxpayers will appreciate the township for. Dyba says it’s a great project from a government perspective because they’re using technology to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of operations but at the same time saving money for taxpayers.

The new system will be backed by manufacturer and incudes a warranty, bringing a lot of additional features and capabilities for staff whole boosting efficiency. The low bid was accepted for the premise based system, which has more security versus a cloud based system. With a cloud-based system, all hardware is off site. Dyba says the big advantage in owning the hardware is that if the company that installs it goes out of business; the township still owns the hardware and can have support from the manufacturer, which is an international company. Installation should be a two-month process starting at the beginning of February and ending by March with actual hardware installation. Dyba says there might be a couple of weeks they have to work with the telephone service provider to switch old numbers to the new system but the actual switchover should be maybe a five minute interruption at most. (JM)