Grant Haarmann is many city employees’ go-to person when a computer crashes at City Hall.
“When you’re ready to throw it out the window and someone comes to fix it, you’re really happy,” Haarmann said.
Haarmann, Jefferson City’s senior computer systems analyst, has worked with the city since graduating from Lincoln University in 2018 with a bachelor’s degree in computer information systems and mathematics and an associate’s degree in computer science.
He said he came to the city because he interned in the IT department in 2017 and felt good about continuing to work at City Hall.
“It felt a little like home,” Haarmann said. “And I enjoyed all the different employees and you get to visit and mingle and build relationships with all of them.”
In the IT department, Haarmann is responsible for maintaining and upgrading the city’s computer systems. Recently, he helped the city upgrade door systems and security cameras at city-owned facilities and converted the city’s online system to Microsoft 365.
It also creates email accounts and iPads for new council members as well as laptops inside police vehicles.
“And because it’s always evolving quickly, you need to stay on top of it to help improve your systems,” he said.
The best part of his job, he says, is the wide range of tasks he gets to do each day.
“One day you can be working in a police car and the next day you can be setting up a credit card machine at the ball fields,” he said. “Because IT touches every department, you really get to meet a lot of people and find out what’s going on in their lives.”
He said he also likes to make the lives of urban workers a little easier by repairing or installing technology that helps them do their jobs.
Haarmann is also the person who troubleshoots temperamental hardware and software. Last week, he helped the city clerk post information to the city’s online calendar, which displays public meetings and meeting agendas. He said the calendar would not be updated with the most recent changes and he had to adjust settings on the city’s website.
To stay on top, Haarmann said he works with other departments to figure out what the problems are and research what technology could solve those problems. For example, he worked with Public Information Coordinator Molly Bryan to improve the “Report a Concern” page on the city’s website.
The reporting form will now allow city staff to track reports and hopefully respond more quickly to residents. Staff members will be able to see when the report arrived and all of these reports will be in one place. Previously, the reporting form sent an email to a city staff member, and because there was no tracking system, those emails could slip through the cracks.
“It’s a lot easier now than digging through a pile of emails,” Haarmann said.
However, Haarmann cannot solve all of City Hall’s problems.
“Budget-wise, you’re kind of limited in the public sector,” he said. “So you can’t go and get every shiny new thing you see. So you try to be resourceful at the same time.”
If he had unlimited funds, Haarmann said he would buy the shiniest objects possible, like servers to speed up urban technology.
“It would be nice to spend a lot of money in the council chambers,” he said, referring to the main meeting room at City Hall. Meetings there are often recorded, streamed live on YouTube and include a WebEx link allowing people to attend virtually. “Make sure everything works perfectly, exactly the way you want it.”