For years, the Norfolk County Registry of Deeds raised concerns about the decision to eliminate the Registry's direct-report Information Technology Department and place responsibility for Registry technology operations under centralized county management. The Registry's position was straightforward: the millions of land records entrusted to the Norfolk County Registry of Deeds require dedicated technology personnel whose sole responsibility is protecting those records and ensuring uninterrupted access to them. The Registry warned that removing that direct accountability would create risks that might not be immediately visible but would eventually become apparent.
Today, many of those concerns are no longer theoretical. The operations and services of the Norfolk Registry of Deeds are being jeopardized.
At a recent Norfolk County Commissioners meeting, it was disclosed that the Registry's IBM server reached its end-of-service date on January 31, 2026. The IBM server is a critical component of the Registry's technology infrastructure. It supports access to millions of recorded land records that document the ownership and transfer of property throughout Norfolk County.
County officials acknowledged that the Registry is now operating beyond the server's end-of-service date. While maintenance coverage remains in place, IBM no longer manufactures new parts for the server and no longer issues updates for the platform. The longer the Registry continues operating beyond that date, the more difficult it will become to obtain replacement parts and the greater the risk that unpatched system vulnerabilities could be exploited.
The troubling question is not simply how the problem will be fixed. The troubling question is how the Registry arrived at this point in the first place. Under the Registry's former direct-report IT structure, major system upgrades were planned years in advance. More importantly, the Registry never allowed its primary IBM server infrastructure to reach an end-of-service date.
I do not recall this ever occurring during my tenure as Register of Deeds, nor under the tenures of my predecessors. Critical technology infrastructure was monitored, evaluated, and upgraded before reaching this point.
The significance of this issue extends beyond a single server. The IBM system is not an ordinary piece of office equipment. It serves as the platform supporting access to millions of land records. Those records establish legal ownership of homes, businesses, and property throughout Norfolk County. The Registry's responsibility is not merely to maintain those records today but to protect them for future generations.
The Registry repeatedly warned during the 2021 and 2022 debate over IT consolidation that eliminating the Registry's dedicated Information Technology Department would reduce accountability and diminish the specialized expertise that had been developed over decades. Those concerns were dismissed. Yet today we find ourselves confronting a circumstance that never previously occurred when dedicated Registry technology professionals reported directly to the Register of Deeds.
The timing of this situation is particularly concerning given Norfolk County government’s past experience with cybersecurity threats. On October 27, 2024, Norfolk County officials discovered that its computer systems had been impacted by a ransomware attack. County servers were encrypted, a ransom note was found, network access was shut down, and a forensic investigation determined that a bad actor had gained access to County systems and claimed to have taken data. Fortunately, there has been no indication that the ransomware incident compromised the Registry of Deeds' land records or property ownership records. However, the incident serves as a reminder that cybersecurity risks are not theoretical. They are real and they underscore the importance of maintaining current technology infrastructure, robust disaster recovery capabilities, and proactive oversight of mission-critical systems.
Against that backdrop, the County's decision to close the Registry's longstanding Disaster Recovery Office in Dedham became even more difficult to understand. In late 2024, Registry officials learned that the longtime Disaster Recovery Office in Dedham was slated for closure after serving as an important component of the Registry's business continuity planning for many years. The facility had proven its value during the COVID-19 pandemic by helping ensure uninterrupted Registry operations. However, neither I nor Registry staff were informed of any of this or even consulted by the County Information Technology Department or County Director despite the facility's importance to Registry operations. Ironically on the way to the meeting to close the Dedham location before any vote had taken place workers were observed stripping the Registry of Deeds signs off the Disaster Recovery Office door. The closing of the office was a done deal before any vote even occurred.
The concerns did not end with the closing of the Dedham facility. Once the decision was made to relocate disaster recovery operations to Walpole, County officials insisted that the new location would be fully operational before the Dedham site was closed. Instead, questions emerged regarding whether the necessary occupancy approvals and accessibility requirements had been satisfied before the facility was declared ready for use. This created the troubling fact that the Registry's Disaster Recovery Office had been closed before its replacement was fully prepared to provide the same level of service and protection.
The failure to adequately prepare the Walpole facility, following the premature closure of the Dedham disaster recovery site, demonstrates a pattern of avoidable, systemic risks stemming from consolidated IT management. The failure of the consolidated County IT Department and/or the direct supervision of Norfolk County Director John J. Cronin to secure an occupancy permit is incompetent management.
Each of the Norfolk County Commissioners – long time former Quincy City Clerk Joseph Shea, 30 year Commissioner and Quincy Attorney Peter Collins and former Canton Selectboard member Richard Staiti – boast to the public about county efficiency. Since creating a consolidated County Information Technology (IT) Department in 2022 the County Commissioners have increased this department’s staff and the costs to run the department. This County IT Department has grown to 4 full time staff persons some of whom got significant raises of $10,000 and $34,000 in one fiscal year.
The most recent example of the incompetence of county government is the failure of the County Information Technology Department to upgrade the IBM Server by the date of January 31, 2026 as required by IBM. The County Information Technology Department under the direct supervision of County Director John J. Cronin did nothing. These IBM upgrades are big and complex projects which the Registry of Deeds when it had a direct report to the Register Registry Information Technology staff and department did a number of times successfully and timely over the years. The consolidated County IT Department’s failure to do this upgrade has put the IBM Server in an end of service status by IBM. This needlessly places the operations and records at the Registry of Deeds at risk.
This incompetent failure to act and unsound decision making jeopardizes Registry services and the land records that give you title to your home. This incompetence by the County IT Department and the County Director who claims “significant experience in managing IT operations” costs you the taxpayers. The County IT Department received a quote to get the IBM server upgrade job done on October 6, 2025. The cost then was $184,619.93. Instead, the County IT staff and County Director John J. Cronin still did nothing. The price of doing nothing by these individuals means public monies are getting wasted. The latest (and the price appears to keep climbing) IBM upgrade cost has grown to $310,268.00. This “efficiency” of Norfolk County government has cost the taxpayers an additional $125,648.07. These are examples of why I fought so hard to keep a direct report to the Register Registry of Deeds Information Technology Department and staff.
I will continue to try to work to address this problem and collaboratively solve this significant issue. Why? The public good calls for this problem to be solved. The operations, services and land records of the Registry of Deeds are needlessly being placed in jeopardy in this era of cybersecurity risks.
My conclusion remains unchanged. The protection of the public land records is best served by dedicated technology professionals whose primary responsibility is the Registry of Deeds and whose accountability runs directly to the Register elected to safeguard those records. The alarms we sounded years ago were not hypothetical. Unfortunately for the property owners of Norfolk County, they are becoming reality. Those elected Norfolk County Commissioners and appointed county officials responsible for this epic failure do not appear to want to have a discussion on accountability. I can only hope negligent actions and unsound decisions by county government officials will stop. Unfortunately, being right is overrated at times.
