Wisconsin: State agency spends $60,000 on iPads for all staffers.

[Scuba]

http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/news/131336349.html


..snip..


Gov. Scott Walker's message has been clear. "Wisconsin is broke, and it's time to start paying our bills today so our kids are not stuck with even bigger bills tomorrow," Walker said earlier this year.

But one state agency may not have gotten the message.

The newly created Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. has dropped a little more than $43,000 to buy 73 iPads for everyone on the staff. The agency, formerly the state Department of Commerce, currently has 63 employees but is in the middle of filling other positions.

Toss in the activation fees and the monthly cost for 3G service for 35 of the iPads, and the cost rises to just about $60,000 for the year.


..end..

[glowing]

1. I actually don't have a problem with Gov using Technology to make them

more efficient and better.. I do have a problem with cutting taxes on the wealthy and throwing teachers out of classrooms when their is a budget "crisis" or what not for political gain of out maneuvering the Unions.

[Scuba]

3. In this case, I'd rather hamstring the gov't agency, which is giving away our State. n/

[FarCenter]

6. Lots of private companies have stopped providing cell phones

They expect employees to provide their own. Usually the employee can get a cell phone with an unlimited use plan for less than the company can.

It also resolves the accounting problems related to splitting the expenses between business and personal use, if personal use is permitted on a company phone. Such accounting is required because otherwise the company has to report the value of personal use on the employees W-2 to the IRS.

Hopefully either Wisconsin employees are only using these for business use, or Wisconsin is reporting imputed income to the IRS.

[Scuba]

7. In this case the "The newly created Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. "....

... is a concoction Walker and cronies put together to more rapidly turn our State over to his corrupt masters. This may fall under the heading of "hush money" for those State employees who aren't on board.



Won't work if that's the case.

[bluestateguy]

5. I do

There is a lot to be said for good old fashioned pencils, papers, chalkboards, rotary phones and file cabinets.

[cui bono]

9. Well using technology doesn not require buying the most expensive tablet available.

And surely they can do what they need to do on a smartphone or a laptop or a netbook. A netbook would cost about 1/3 of what those iPads do.

[LiberalFighter]

17. I wouldn't have a problem if it reduces cost but considering

who is going to use them I doubt it will. I doubt that everyone in the department has a need for them.

[Enrique]

2. at least they're not wasting the money on poor people

:sarcasm:

[BadgerKid]

4. Oh, the staff must certainly be underpaid - give 'em raises, too.

:sarcasm:

[dkf]

8. Would we have a problem buying them computers and giving them broadband access?

Geez.

[cui bono]

10. Those can be bought much cheaper than iPads. Plus they probably already have computers.

There is a difference between necessity and extravagance, and iPads are not a necessity.

[DaveJ]

13. iPads are easy enough for them to use

Doubt his staffers would do anything that requires the slightest mental effort.

[cui bono]

16. Did you mean to respond to my post? I don't think I said they were difficult to use.

:shrug:

[XanaDUer]

11. So?

I'ts the wave of the future, and they need to have them.

[RagAss]

12. Why feed the hungry when you can tweet your mental turds.

[musiclawyer]

14. I work in local government

Many local government departments (taxpayers) would save lots of money if they ditched windows and went apple. (It's not possible for some deparments like tax collectors, auditos, and assessors who use industry-wide software that only run on windows.) Windows requires an an army of IT people constantly rooting out virus and breakdowns and crappy updates from MS Long run, any single department (where suitable) that goes iPad will save taxpayer dollars. That's a fact. Walker is sinister in many ways. But this is not one of them.

[Posteritatis]

15. So the actual cost is about $480/yr/iPad and the bulk of it's a one-time expense

$40/mo may or may not be in the steep side - I don't know enough about American mobile pricing - but I'm pretty unoffended by this one, depending on what the tablets are being used for.