Voice over IP phone systems are not new, but the technology needed time to mature in order for the quality to go up and the costs to go down. Periodically over the last decade Broome County Information Technology's Telecom Division checked into VoIP, but we weren‘t able to make a solid business case for the move, until now.

We are very happy to announce that Spring/Summer 2010 we rolled out a new Cisco VoIP system to the George Harvey Justice Building and the Broome County Office Building. This system not only saves money, it delivers new functionality such as prescence and instant messaging while opening the door to future possibilities in communication advancements.

As a result of our patience in picking the right time to implement VoIP, Broome County has been highlighted in Government Computer News.

• http://gcn.com/articles/2010/04/19/broome-county-unified-lessons.aspx
• http://gcn.com/articles/2010/04/19/broome-county-unified-comms.aspx

We’ve also been approached by other Counties as a model for their own plans to implement VoIP in their counties.

We are very proud of this accomplishment and our county for continuing to be progressive and innovative while striving to save Taxpayer dollars.