Web and Managed Services Hosting

Hello:
                  This one is a little technical and a little
political.  We are in a situation with quite a bit of history.  We have
a corporate intranet that was developed/deployed by one person working
in one of the applications groups about 4-5 years back, it predates me. 
At the time, Linux was four-letter word.  Originally he built the box
and the application(s):  Apache, perl, mod_perl, postgresql.  Apache is
a custom install, built from source (1.3.2x).  There is an ODBC bridge
to a MSSQL DB on another box and there is web-based reporting that has
links to a SYBASE DB on a Solaris host (uses SYBASE SDK).  There are
also two additional boxes, one for developers, one for staging.  Over
the years (I work in technical support), I've become more involved,
doing the OS Installs/upgrades, keeping the box(es) patched, migrating
code from staging to production, etc, it has developed (from my view)
into a reasonably good collaborative effort.  We are at a point now
where we've outgrown the production box, we just purchased a new server
and are migrating from RH 9 to RHES.  So, now, my management wants to
limit administrative access to the box to just technical support, I
think the term is providing "Web and Managed Services Hosting".   

                   So much for the history, the question is how to go
forward?  I'd be very interested in hearing from folks about what the
strategies/tools they use for providing the services, without
compromising security.  I will gladly summarize.  

>From a functional standpoint, the services that need to be provided
are:
- Build/maintain OS
- Normal linux system administration functions:  system monitoring,
user maintenance, etc.
- Installing SYBASE SDK
- Building Apache, including configuring/compiling mod_perl and mod_ssl

- Configuring Apache, including site developed modules
- Install & configure EasySoft ODBC bridge
- Install, configure and load postgresql
- Install/migrate content
- Ongoing, migrating application code from staging to production
- Compile, configure, index search engine (mnoGoSearch)
- On going break-fixes, some of which are data based, some of which are
application (code) based.

Thanks,
Dave
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