County approves VoIP change

The Lancaster County Board agreed on Tuesday to enter into a package deal with the city of Lincoln to change from traditional phone service to Voice Over Internet Protocol, an Internet-based phone system.

The move will cut the county's $365,000 phone budget in half. Collectively, the county and city will save more than $600,000 a year with the change.

The VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) phone system uses traditional phones, nevertheless it uses Ethernet cables and an Internet network to connect parties. The process is similar to Skype, a popular Internet-based system.

The initial investment for new phones is $800,000 for the county and $1.1 million for the city, nevertheless the payments would be amortized over four years with no budget impact, county budget director Dennis Meyer said.