City Discovers IT Staff Outnumber Actual Computers, Plans Herd-Them-All-Together Solution

In a stunning display of bureaucratic inefficiency, the City of Austin has discovered that it employs more IT staff than a Silicon Valley startup has kombucha dispensers. An external audit—which, let’s be real, probably cost another few million to produce—revealed that Austin’s IT spending is 81% higher than that of peer cities. Peer cities, of course, being those mythical places where governments don’t use floppy disks in 2026.

The city’s brilliant solution? Consolidate 1,000 IT workers into one big, happy, dysfunctional family. Because nothing says “efficiency” like herding a thousand cat-herders into a single room and expecting them to agree on which cloud service to use. City Manager T.C. Broadnax, who presumably has a background in herding cats, called for this audit last May. Shockingly, the full report hasn’t been released to the public—probably because it’s written in Comic Sans and stored on a Zip drive.

Union workers, those pesky advocates for things like “job security” and “not being treated like interchangeable cogs,” protested on the steps of City Hall. They delivered an open letter asking Broadnax to stop the “One ATS” consolidation, which sounds less like a tech initiative and more like a discount oat milk brand. AFSCME members, in their infinite wisdom, declared they “won’t support harmful, consultant-driven reorganizations.” Consultants, of course, being the people who get paid six figures to suggest things like “have you tried turning it off and on again?”

Geospatial Analyst Braniff Davis voiced concerns that response times would slow under centralization. “If a natural disaster strikes,” he warned, “our city won’t have the specialist expertise needed.” Translation: When the zombie apocalypse hits, don’t expect your GIS maps to load while you’re fleeing the hordes. The city’s CIO, Kerrica Laake, assured everyone that no layoffs are planned—just a “healthier, more coordinated organization.” Because nothing coordinates like taking experts in flood mapping and making them reset passwords for the parks department.

CFO Ed Van Eenoo proudly announced that this efficiency drive started before the city’s failed property tax hike. “We didn’t wait for the community to say, ‘Hello, we need government to operate more efficiently,’” he chirped. Bravo, Ed! It’s like realizing your car is on fire and deciding to polish the hubcaps before calling the fire department. Priorities!

In the end, Austin’s IT consolidation is a masterclass in innovation: spend millions to save millions, upset everyone, and create a system where the only thing running smoothly is the consultants’ billing software. Disruption achieved!