LV: Baloži city to move to open source desktop
The public administration of the Latvian city of Baloži will switch to open source software, the administration announced on 3 June.
The plan is estimated to save the city, a few kilometres south of the capital of Riga, some 100,000 lats (about 140,000 euro) over the next four years.
The Baloži city council has decided to stop purchasing proprietary software licences and is preparing to migrate to free and open source software. In the mean time, te public administration will continue to use its proprietary software licences.
According to Andis Adats, the chairman of the Baloži city council the city has two more reasons to move to open source. "IT develops at such a blistering pace, that it just does not make sense to pay for software that is obsolete the next year. We also need to think ahead, and prepare for regional reform."
Baloži will amalgamate with two other municipalities Ķekava and Daugavmale to form the larger Ķekava district and all the municipal IT systems will need to be linked merged. If the migration in Baloži is successful, then extending it to the new district could provide much larger savings, Adats explains.
According to news reports, the members of the city council are under pressure to save money in the city budget due to the shrinking tax revenues. Another reason are the municipal elections that are taking place this week.
More information:
Diena news item (in Latvian)
Dienas Bizness news item (in Latvian)
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