NEW ULM — Brown County commissioners unanimously approved the purchase of human services server software Tuesday.

Brown County IT (Information Technology) Director Nathan Beran said Brown County Human Services has used CaseWorks as a very successful work tool that eliminated lots of paperwork and improved efficiency since 2019, but the vendor, NCT, released a new version of the system requiring a CaseWorks software upgrade.

Beran said the original server software was implemented in 2019 and will be at the end of its life in July 2026. He said the low quote for s three-year server software subscription is $35,706.13.

“This is expensive. What’s the lifespan?” said Commissioner Scott Windschitl.

“Following a two-month update process, the system should be pretty reliable for five to eight years. The old system can’t be updated anymore after next summer,” said Beran.

“Because this stuff changes so often, would there be any value in waiting until a month before the software goes out of service and making the change?” said Commissioner Windschitl.

“Probably not. It takes at least two months to do the update if everything works well. We now have the capacity for the update,” said Beran. “If we wait, we’d have to compete with everyone else lagging for the vendor at that time. I have anxiety about how much risk we’re willing to take. This is pretty critical to our environment. Any future updates in the system are only available with the new version.”

Brown County Human Services Director Anne Broskoff said CaseWorks brings a lot of efficiency to her department’s work.

“It eliminates lost pieces of paper and enables electronic ordering,” she said.

Broskoff said human services was not aware of the required upgrades when planning for the 2025 county budget.

Commissioner Brian Braun said said he’d rather handle the server software costs this year instead of next year.

“We’re already battling with budgets, trying to keep next year’s costs down,” he said.

The software purchase came on a motion by Commissioner Brian Braun, seconded by Dave Borchert.