Few things in today’s computer-based society strike greater terror in the hearts of man and woman than the idea of their personal computer crashing and their files being wiped out. You can imagine then, a little, how Nancy Brooks, Clerk of the Town of Lockport, New York, felt when informed that the server housing the database of Town information and records had crashed and its backup tapes appeared to be blank.

The Town’s Information Services Technician and the outsource vendor who provides technical computer support set about trying to retrieve the years of information that had been input into the Laserfiche® files, she said. They were able to retrieve data off some of the drives, but the data appeared to be unusable.

“My next thought,” Nancy says, “was 'Call General Code. I trust they’ll know what to do. Maybe it’s a simple fix.’”

Initially, General Code’s Laserfiche Support Technician, Brian Hoody, worked by phone with the Town’s in-house and outsource personnel, offering suggestions and assessing the situation. Ultimately, according to Nancy Brooks, “they dropped everything and came. They were great. Tim Donovan (a General Code Representative) and Brian understood the severity of the situation. They tried to keep me on an even keel. I couldn’t fathom what I would have to do if we couldn’t retrieve the information.”.

What did Lockport have in those files? Brooks rattled off a quick list: All the legal documents of the Town of Lockport; minutes of Town meetings all the way back to the beginning, including Planning and Zoning Board meetings. Additionally, the Court had begun adding its records to the system. And, the Deputy Clerk had spent three months in the County Clerk’s office scanning into a laptop every Town-related document in the County’s files and then downloading that data into the system.

“We thought we had done everything right,” Nancy says. “We had bought the server that was recommended. We kept it in a separate building and kept the backup tapes in a vault in another building. We thought we had covered everything.” In fact, as it turned out, the Town had done almost everything they needed to do. The missing piece was in maintaining documentation for IT staff and outsourced computer support for how to retrieve information from the backups.

Brian Hoody, General Code’s Laserfiche Support Technician

At the end of the day, and much to Nancy’s delight, Brian Hoody was able to retrieve 98% of the information and help the Town’s database get back up and running. In summarizing what was learned from the experience, Brian wrote: “Their backup is what saved them in the long run. It had been set up and was running properly before the server crashed…The fundamental problem with the situation was that there were no documented procedures in place for the backup - no one had the information to know even what application was used to perform the actual backup. It is essential that this process be documented so that if IT staff or a key individual who knows the process is not available, that said process could still be followed in a pinch.”

What it all boiled down to is that the server failed, as servers are known to do. However, when it came to the backups “the main overriding problem was that many different software had been used, and what had been used to do what, was not clearly documented,” Nancy said.

Working with your IT staff and/or network administrator, General Code can provide the necessary information about what needs to be backed up in order to protect your documents from a catastrophic event. Then, the IT staff, ensuring the backups are done and tested regularly, can document the procedures for the benefit and peace of mind of everyone concerned.

How are things changing in Lockport? “We’re going to be changing the server, not just greater capacity, but how we deal with it and how we back it up. There will be a backup to the backup,” Nancy says. Especially now, because the Town is having a GPS (global positioning system) layer added so that users can click on a specific lot on a map and be linked to all documents concerning that lot.

When asked, Nancy Brooks says she has learned “how important it is to know more about the whole process; I need to educate myself more so I can be sure to ask the right questions.” And, she adds, “(I’ve learned) how important it is to document everything when it comes to software and hardware being used, and to communicate and coordinate between departments.”

She can laugh about it now, but she’s not joking when she says, “If we ever crash again, I hope it’s well after I retire.” In the meantime, General Code will still be just a phone call away.

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