NATCHEZ — Adams County will begin advertising for an information technology specialist this weekend.

The board of supervisors decided earlier this year to hire a full-time IT technician on the advice of County Administrator Joe Murray, who said that for what the county was paying its contracted IT firm — Premise Inc. — in monthly fees and overtime, the county could hire a full-time person.

The backlog of problems that needed to be addressed could not always be gotten to in the days allotted by the contract.

While Murray said a more detailed job description will be available for interested applicants, the main requirement will be that they must be competent in maintaining the AS/400 system and must have extensive experience in programming for that system.

“We are not looking for somebody who can just come over here and fix our computers when they break down, we are looking for somebody who can help the county move forward on a lot of things,” Murray said.

Adams County’s various offices all use the Delta System, software that most counties in Mississippi use to administer their various departments. The new IT director would have to work with it, Murray said.

“We are hoping that one day we can develop some kind of program to meld all of it together that we can pull information out of all these systems to help us be more efficient,” Murray said. “For example, we could pull from the voter rolls to make sure we have a good address for trash collection.”

Supervisors President Darryl Grennell said the county would likely have the IT person update the county websites and develop a way for the county to take payments online for taxes and sanitation.

“It is going to take an in-house person to do this,” Grennell said.

Natchez Native Ed Sonjay, who has a background in computer work, has volunteered his time to help the county develop a list of qualifications and a vision for an IT department, Grennell said.

“This guy is not getting paid, this is something he is willing to do to give back to the community,” Grennell said.

“This guy is a visionary with respect to technology, and he basically said yes there is a need for an IT person in Adams County.”

Murray said previous publications in local media have drawn dozens of unsolicited resumes for the job, but those who have sent in resumes will need to resubmit their resumes with the county-mandated letter of application.

Grennell said the cost of the future IT director’s salary has not yet been decided, and will be subject to negotiation and will be commiserate with the applicant’s experience.

The deadline for the application period will be July 31.