World Wide Web Site Design and Use in Public Management

The World Wide Web (Web) has been widely adopted by local governments as a way to interact with local residents. The promise and reality of Web applications are explored in this chapter. Four types of Web utilizations are analyzed—bulletin board applications; promotion applications; service delivery applications; and citizen input applications. A survey of 145 municipal and county government websites originally conducted in 1998 was replicated in 2002. These data are used to examine how local governments are actually using the Web and to examine the evolution of Web usage over the four years between the first and second survey. The chapter concludes that local governments have made progress in incorporating many of the features of the Web but that they have a long way to go in realizing its full promise.

Information Technology as a Facilitator of Results-Based Management in Government

The most widely accepted normative model of “good” public management is often called results-based management. It encourages planning and target setting to make the organization more proactive; an emphasis on outcomes to make the organization better focused on its mission; quick performance feedback to make the organization more responsive; and continuous process improvements to make the organization better able to serve its clients. These changes are possible only with supporting information technology. This chapter discusses ways that IT, including GIS, EIS, and intranets, can support the new management model. However, IT can increase management effectiveness only if its role has been carefully designed. Before implementing major IT changes, top public managers must begin by determining such policy issues as what information would best guide upcoming major decisions; what balance the agency wishes between internal information accessibility versus security; and how best to balance frontline worker empowerment versus the need for organizational uniformity.

Mediating the Tension between Information Privacy and Information Access

Government agencies collect and disseminate data that bear on the most important issues of public interest. Advances in information technology, particularly the Internet, have multiplied the tension between demands for evermore comprehensive databases and demands for the shelter of privacy. In mediating between these two conflicting demands, agencies must address a host of difficult problems. These include providing access to information while protecting confidentiality, coping with health information databases, and ensuring consistency with international standards. The policies of agencies are determined by what is right for them to do, what works for them, and what they are required to do by law. They must interpret and respect the ethical imperatives of democratic accountability, constitutional empowerment, and individual autonomy. They must keep pace with technological developments by developing effective measures for making information available to a broad range of users. They must both abide by the mandates of legislation and participate in the process of developing new legislation that is responsive to changes that affect their domain. In managing confidentiality and data access functions, agencies have two basic tools: techniques for disclosure limitation through restricted data and administrative procedures through restricted access. The technical procedures for disclosure limitation involve a range of mathematical and statistical tools. The administrative procedures can be implemented through a variety of institutional mechanisms, ranging from privacy advocates, through internal privacy review boards, to a data and access protection commission.

The Realities of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995

The strategic management practices required for the use of information and information technologies under the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (P.L. 104-13, 44 U.S.C. § 3501) comprise an important toolkit for federal agencies. There is a special need for strategic planning and management of information in an era of electronic government initiatives, homeland security, federal workforce retention problems, and inter/intra-governmental agency data sharing programs and systems. The PRA sets the policy agenda for information resources management in the US federal government and places the guidance and oversight for enacting the PRA in the Executive Office of Management and Budget (OMB). At both the level of guidance and practice, the PRA has had mixed success since it was initially signed into law in 1980. OMB has not met its statutory responsibilities under the PRA, and the federal government is left without a cohesive direction and agenda for information resources management.

Computer Tools for Better Public Sector Management

Almost any public sector task employing a computer can be accomplished more efficiently with a variety of tools rather than any single one. Basic tools are word processing, spreadsheet, statistics, and database management programs. Beyond these, Web authoring software, presentation graphics, optical character recognition (OCR), and project planning and management software can be helpful depending upon the job at hand.

Leading-Edge Information Technologies and American Local Governments

In this study, I examine the adoption, penetration and impacts of the adoption of leading-edge information technologies in American local governments. I also discuss future trends with respect to these technologies. Data for this study come from three nationwide surveys of information technology in local governments and a series of case studies in US cities about the adoption of leading-edge information technologies. My principal findings are that American local governments have adopted a range of these technologies and can be expected to do so in coming years. This is especially true of the adoption of electronic government. Local government characteristics associated with adoption include principally local government size as measured by population. Other characteristics include type and form of government, region of the country, and metropolitan status. Additionally, local governments adopt leading-edge information technologies for both general reasons (e.g., to improve efficiency and effectiveness) and to solve specific problems (e.g., the adoption of automated fingerprint identification systems to solve crimes).

E-Government

Information technology has fundamentally altered many aspects of daily life, including interactions with the government. The role of the Internet continues to increase as more citizens use it to find pertinent information, purchase goods and services, and to participate in virtual communities. By capitalizing on the Internet revolution, governments can create new channels of communication and new methods for participation via e-government. The changing environment, coupled with citizen and business demands, encourages government involvement in e-government initiatives and related uses of information technologies. This essay offers an overview of the historical premises, theoretical constructs, and associated typologies of e-government. These typologies posit a framework for understanding e-government, its potential benefits, and its related challenges.

Politics, Accountability, and Governmental Information Systems

Information systems are becoming more involved in politics due to the growth of the World Wide Web, electronic government, and the increasing digitization of information of all kinds. Many information management specialists lack knowledge and experience about how to deal with political aspects of information management, and consequently they are ineffective. This chapter shows how important political issues are to information managers and illustrates strategies that can be useful in dealing with political issues. I provide several examples of how inattention to the political aspects of managing information systems can result in problems and disasters. The chapter covers both internal and external politics. Information managers have to deal with many internal politically-charged tasks such as the structuring of information management, purchasing information systems, managing personnel in this era of digital communication, and struggles over the sharing of information within organizations. External information management issues are also becoming important such as demands for online accountability information, the development of websites, issues over access to information, and interorganizational issues including disputes over turf.

Electronic Mail in the Public Workplace

The increasing use of electronic mail in the workplace has generated important legal questions for public organizations. The legal questions concerning e-mail in public institutions and agencies fall into two basic categories: (a) issues of employee privacy regarding e-mail messages; and (b) public access to e-mail under applicable freedom of information legislation. While the employer has broad legal grounds for reading workplace e-mail, at least if there is some legitimate business reason for doing so, employees frequently feel that such monitoring is an excessive invasion of their privacy, and the result sometimes is organizational conflict over these privacy issues. These privacy concerns have generated demands for greater protection of employee privacy in this area, and some states have responded with legislation that covers e-mail in the workplace. Government organizations also must treat at least some of their e-mail as part of the public record, making it open to public access, but this also can lead to conflict between public administrators, who may feel that much of their e-mail represents thoughts that were not intended for public disclosure, and external groups, such as the press, who feel that all such information belongs in the public domain. State laws vary considerably in terms of how they define the types of e-mail messages that are part of the public record, some being far more inclusive than others. Given the uncertainty and confusion that frequently exist regarding these legal questions, it is essential that public organizations develop and publicize an e-mail policy that both clarifies what privacy expectations employees should have regarding their e-mail and specifies what recording keeping requirements for e-mail should be followed to appropriately retain public records.

Geographic Information Systems in the Public Sector

Geographic information systems emerged in the 1970s and have become significant decision-making tools as their capabilities have been enhanced. This chapter includes a brief discussion of various GIS applications and a more detailed discussion of issues that public managers should consider when evaluating implementation of a geographic information system. GIS applications provide benefits at the basic level in terms of producing maps efficiently, at the planning level through the use of database applications, and at the management decision-making level through an ability to access relational databases for policy-level decisions. In considering the capacity of GIS in the public sector, concise definitions of the major application theories—vector and raster—are offered to provide a basic understanding of the analytical process and GIS toolkit aspects. Issues impacting GIS implementation include needs assessment, project planning, access to public records, liability issues, public and private partnerships, dissemination of information, and privacy issues. Public managers should be aware of difficulties associated with justification of costs associated with GIS implementation and that a hesitancy exists on the part of GIS program managers to share missteps and implementation failures.