DEPARTMENT: Information Technology
FILE TYPE: Consent Action
TITLE
title
Authorization To Execute Contract With Scalence LLC, Subsidiary Of Artech LLC, For Replacement Of County Public Website Platform
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PURPOSE/ACTION REQUESTED
Authorize the Deputy County Manager to execute a contract with Scalence LLC, a subsidiary of Artech LLC, to implement a new public-facing website platform.
SUMMARY
Dakota County currently uses Microsoft SharePoint 2016 as our public-facing website platform. The current system is self-hosted, not cloud hosted, and supports our three main websites: Main, Parks, and Library.
Although this web platform has served us for many years, we're facing the following challenges:
1. Our current version is outdated; support for this version ends in July 2026.
2. Our current product version, which is almost ten years old, was not built to meet the newest digital accessibility requirements from the outset, making conformance to accessibility standards inherently more difficult.
3. Microsoft's newest version of SharePoint requires users to log in; we can no longer create websites that would be open to the public on this platform.
In October of 2024, Dakota County published a request for proposals for a new enterprise-grade, web platform. We received 26 proposals, of which five vendors were brought in to provide product demonstrations. The project team selected Artech's proposal to implement Adobe Experience Manager-a scalable, accessible, future-proof, cloud-based platform.
RECOMMENDATION
recommendation
Staff recommend the Board authorize the Deputy County Manager to execute a contract with Scalence LLC, a subsidiary of Artech LLC, to implement the new public website platform in an amount not to exceed $2,764,568. This amount includes initial development costs, licensing and support costs from October 2025 through 2029.
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EXPLANATION OF FISCAL/FTE IMPACTS
Year 1, Platform configuration, implementation, and licenses (Oct 2025 - Dec 2025)...
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