Christie aims for consolidating N.J. government IT operations to protect public

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is moving toward centralizing the state government’s information technology functions.

Saying that it’s absurd for each state department to have its own IT staff and operations, Christie said he  believes the Office of Information Technology could better perform those functions.

It’s important, he said, because so much information from private citizens is safeguarded by state government.

“And if any of you have gone through the nightmare of identity theft — and I have — it’s ugly,” Christie said. “So we need to do everything we can to make sure that we don’t contribute to that possibility for any one of our citizens.”

Christie has issued an executive order requiring state agencies to inventory their IT assets so consolidation plans can move forward.

“This executive order puts every Cabinet member notice that, in our last seven months in office, we are going to inexorably begin the conversion to a centralized I-T function and have that come out of the departments,” said the governor. “They don’t know how to do it.”

Christie said he looks forward to a centralized system that is more secure, efficient, and reliable.