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Friday, December 11,1987/The Battalion/Page 3
State and Local
CS council passes plan
to buy computer system
By Mark Gee
Staff Writer
Luck has been on the side of Col-
je Station’s city government dur
ing its wait for a computerized man
agement system.
Last night, the College Station
City Council voted unanimously not
to chance disaster when it approved
a 5-year, $3 million plan to purchase
reliable computer systems and
software for the city’s service depart
ments.
“We’ve been lucky,” Public Rela
tions Director Peggy Calliham said,
that we haven’t had a major crisis
with the city’s payroll or utilities bil-
'«■” .
Pushing luck has worked to the
council’s advantage, Calliham said,
because computer prices have
dropped in the past several years
while the technology has advanced.
The wait has also given the council
the opportunity to evaluate other cit
ies, she said.
A crisis in utilities billing would
mean long lines for the 30,000 stu
dents, faculty and employees of
Texas A&M who live in College Sta
tion.
Linda Piwonka, the utilities billing
supervisor, said she can’t imagine
the long lines if the billing computer
was to break during a peak week in
May or August when students are
requesting utility deposit returns
and establishing utility accounts. She
said there was a minor crisis when a
computer broke the first week in
May. Her office wrote all service or
ders by hand, which took twice as
long as using the computer.
“We’re lucky the breakdown
wasn’t the third week in May when
students want their utility deposits
back,” Piwonka said. “That’s why
we’re changing the system now.”
The system allows each depart
ment to buy the equipment to meet
its specific needs. The $427,000 for
this fiscal year will be generated
from contingency funds and unap
propriated interest earnings. Over
the next four years, the system will
be paid by income generated from
the utility department, debt service
funds and utility revenue bonds.
The council will not raise property
tax rates to purchase the system.
The computerized information
system will also help College Station
plan for growth. Utilities Depart
ment Director John Woody said a
new computer mapping system will
be linked to customer billing.
“With this new system,” Woody
said, “I’ll be able to do a better job of
making sure the power system can
meet the customer’s needs. The
quality of electrical supply is impor
tant in the computer age.”
Currently, Woody’s utility depart
ment uses a map that has been up
dated for 20 years with pins. Color-
coded thumbtacks mark utility lines.
The old system relies on employees
in the utility department who re
member where the lines were laid.
Cisneros meets Gorbachev,
pushes grassroots politics
SAN ANTONIO (AP) —Mayor
Henry Cisneros said Thursday night
he told Soviet leader Mikhail Gorba
chev that grassroots politics would
be the key to restructuring the Com
munist country.
Cisneros was among six leaders
from across the nation who met with
Gorbachev and other Soviet leaders
during a breakfast meeting Thurs
day at the Soviet Embassy.
Cisneros, Class of ’68, is a former
member of the Board of Regents.
Cisneros, the past president of the
National League of Cities, said he
told Gorbachev that the United
States’ strength lies within its system
of decentralized government and
the country’s ethnic diversity.
“I suggested to him that most of
the big problems that confront the
society, like transforming our educa
tional system and dealing with our
racial diversity, are going to be set
tled lower in the federal system,”
Cisneros said.
“I said if he wanted to accomplish
what he wanted to accomplish . . .
their total restructuring of Soviet so
ciety, that he would have to devise a
system where there was more initia
tive and more vitality at the grass
roots level working its way up, in
stead of a top-down, centralized,
planned structure, and that our ex
perience was that that was more ef-
snt Gov-
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Cisneros, who is in his fourth term
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Cisneros said the 1 Va-hour meet
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The mayor also said that Soviet
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“I feel it would be a very good
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