Rena Rogers is the new Cook County information systems and communications director, replacing Dana McKenzie. Rogers has been a property owner in Cook County for 11 years and said she is thrilled to be living and working here.
Rena Rogers, newly hired director of information systems and communications director, came before the Cook County board with a brief report on Tuesday, April 8, 2014.
“I have been very welcomed here by everyone, by the commissioners, the staff and others that I met. I have an outstanding staff of four really competent, hard working guys.
“My first impression having come from a state government where I was in an IT department is that the breadth of the work done by the county—the media towers and code red and human services and broadband—the breadth of things that you have to pay attention to at any given moment—is that you have everything to think about that Hennepin County does but with a lot fewer resources.”
Before coming to Cook County Rogers worked in organizational development at the Office of Enterprise Technology for the state of Minnesota. Prior to that she was a software designer, a technical writer and for two years taught school for 5th and 6th grades.
Born and raised in Tempe, Arizona, Rogers holds three college degrees, a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in elementary education from Arizona State University; a B.A. in computer science from Southern Illinois; and an M.S. in elementary education/math education from Southern Illinois.
“I think my background gives me good anchors to understand both the technical and business side of IT as it relates to the county,” said Rogers, who has owned land in Cook County for 11 years and has recently completed a house on her property.
Rogers said her first priorities are to, “take a look at what we have in place and figure out how to make things more secure and more reliable.”
She cited the coming of broadband and said, “Everyone is asking us to open the gates and let everyone in. We’ve largely been supporting internal operations (IT). Now everyone is asking to open the safe and bring everyone in.”
She said she was concerned about being able to keep the public’s information secure, and wondered aloud how 24-hour service would be possible when she wouldn’t have staff working at night, but she felt solutions could be found.
Rogers said when she started six weeks ago that there were 50 projects written on a white board. “But my experience is that four people can’t get 50 projects done,” so she has reduced that to a few projects. Those projects include getting a new room to house the server; improve the firewall/security monitoring, connect all of the county buildings with fiber, get a new phone system that makes better use of the fiber network and create a back-up storage area network in another building.
She also said she wants to keep the public informed and up to date about IT decisions that might affect them.
“Anytime we make a change, something that is going to impact the public, we need to make that information available. We will have a broader communication strategy,” she said.
Last but not least, Rogers said she will always seek efficiency, always seek to cut costs and always seek to deliver services in a better way. “I’m always going to ask if there is a better way to do something,” she told commissioners.
In her free time Rogers serves as a member of Cook County Higher Education board. She said she loves the outdoors, loves to hike in the woods and walk the shore and throw rocks in Lake Superior when she gets the chance.
“We have kayaks and canoes that are buried under stuff right now, but we plan on digging them out and using them in the summer. I also used to do a lot of dogsledding, but not so much recently. I love being here. I like the winter and I like the outdoors.”
In other business
. Mark Sandbo of Grand Marais asked the county board to send a letter of support for his continued service on the Governor’s Council on Minnesota’s Lake Superior Coastal Program. Sandbo replaced the late Jim Johnson on the council. The board agreed to send a letter of support.
. Diane Booth, Community Center director, came before the board with a revision of the Community Center Board of Trustees by-laws. After a series of questions by the commissioners, it was decided that they would give them to Cook County administrator Jay Kieft. Kieft will organize them and work with Booth to make changes to the by-laws, which Booth will present to the board at a later date.
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