Wireless Week

Bill Sipes discusses his experiences with ITS in the latest version of Wireless Week (an informal publication of the wireless group in the division that I direct):

"I have been thrust into a world that I know very little about but have been accepted, encouraged and challenged. I have learned enough buzz words to make it appear that I know a little about what I am doing and talking about. I have visited with the Navajo Indian folks in Arizona, been on several mountain tops, tried to climb that 100’ tower, talked with a number of emergency management folks around the state, staked out an area proposed for a communications site, talked and met with agents of several different federal and local government organizations, met with several sheriffs, police, and fire chiefs eager to establish better communications in their communities, even met with and spoken to a couple of environmental representatives expressing their concerns… talk about a growing experience."

Bill is involved in the buildout of our 700 MHz mobile data network (see picture) and other products.

IT Consolidation Featured in StateTech

I was quoted quite extensively in the current issue of StateTech magazine in the cover article on legislating IT consolidation since Utah is right in the middle of the process along with Missouri. I had forgotten about the interview until I happened to be glancing through the magazine a couple of days ago. I have also been maintaining a list of IT consolidation news on del.icio.us.

NIC Posts Positive Earnings Report

NIC, the company that makes a living by supporting state portal and online services for more than 18 states, announced its quarterly earnings today. Quarterly earnings are up 35% over last year. NIC is rolling out several services in conjunction with the state of Utah right now including the State Construction Registry and version three of Renewal Express, which will allow drivers to get their plate tags issued at the inspection station. Utah Interactive is the local NIC affiliate.

E-Governance in European Cities Evaluated

1	Birmingham
2	Barcelona
3	Amsterdam
4	London
5	Glasgow
6	Edinburgh
7	Vienna
8	Dublin
9	Sheffield
10	Leeds

The recent ratings of city e-governance in Europe reflect a dominance by the UK. I was not surprized to see Leeds squeeze into the top-10 or see Barcelona near the top of the list. The entire list of 35 can be seen on the EU's website. Scandinavia was excluded from the survey. Otherwise, I would certainly expect to see Copenhagen on the list. It is interesting to note that the authors see Barcelona as something of an anomaly with characteristics more in common with "Anglo-Saxon" websites than is the case for other continental cities.

Link: "E-Governance Developments in EU Cities"

The Other Salt Lake City

Charley Foster points out a Salt Lake City that is located in India, on the outskirts of Calcutta. Here's a map of the other Salt Lake City. As a major business hub, the other Salt Lake City is also becoming a hotspot for IT development. Modern office buildings are springing up there along with a stadium that seats 120,000 people - reportedly the largest stadium in Asia. Salt Lake is home to Jadavpur University and companies like Brainware India, NetGuru, Descon, and Wipro. They are located in an electronics zone known as "Sector V of Salt Lake". Check out Infinity Park, one of the landmark developments of the area.

Novell's eGov Success in Europe

Under the headline, "Leeds Council aims for IT integration nirvana", the Register discusses Leeds' recent contract award to Novell,

"Leeds City Council has awarded Novell a six year contract to completely
overhaul its internal and external IT services as it approaches the government's
end-of-2005 deadline for making eGovernment services available online. The value of the contract was not disclosed.

The council says the Novell contract is just one part of a much larger systems overhaul. Anthony Burnham, programme manager for Leeds City Council notes: "From a technical perspective, we have over 300 offices around the region with many different departments and found we were running up to 850 different applications across 140 servers."

I am impressed with the Leeds City Council Corporate Plan for 2005-2008. It is a scorecard approach to government with very measurable goals and objectives.

They are also regularly measuring their egovernment initiatives which are quite extensive.

Link: Leeds City website

State of Technology

Rich Nelson writes this upbeat article about the state of technology in Utah in the July issue of Connect magazine. According to Nelson:

"Clearly, Utah is an ideal center for technology where companies can start and thrive. With technology, business, government and academic leaders working together, the state will explode with opportunities for economic development. I believe Utah is on the brink of technological greatness."

511 Services Continue to Grow Nationally

Utah's John Njord chairs the 511 Deployment Coalition, a group of states that have installed 511 systems. The states in red have already installed systems, those in yellow should be launching soon. The Timeline of 511 Services in Operation provides more detail on the nationwide rollout.

The Coalition has recently published a 2005 Progress Report.

Employee Aptitude System

We completed an assessment of IT assets in the State of Utah at the end of June and have begun implementing information systems to leverage that data. One is an employee aptitude system that allows us to search for skills throughout the whole of state government.

We developed a large number of assessment reports that can be used to enhance decision-making and planning in the process of the upcoming statewide IT consolidation.

More Outsourcing of State Medicaid Systems

EDS continues to move aggressively into the state government technology services market. According to their website, they appear to be most interested in the healthcare, homeland security, and ERP markets and it certainly is paying dividents. In the last month alone, they have signed a $173 million contract with Kentucky and a $79 million contract with Oregon. The Kentucky deal is currently being protested. In addition to the Medicaid contract, Kentucky has also awarded a $113 million contract to First Health for call center operations and disease management programs. According to the Computer Business Review, EDS now manages 19 of these state Medicaid contracts.

The Best of eGov in the UK

The Government Forum presents an interesting list of the top 74 egov sites in the United Kingdom. The rankings seem to be based on accessability.

This site offers an easy way for citizens to submit images and information as the UK police attempt to hunt down the London bombers and other terrorists.

Moving My Government & Technology Weblog

I've decided to move my primary blog and give it a facelift. After trying out Moveable Type, eNewsBlog, Radio, PHP Nuke, and various other tools, I will settle on Blogger. Time for blogposting is limited and the Blogger interface is quick and easy to use. Google seems to be dedicated to continuous enhancements and the new photo hosting tool may be what convinced me. It was difficult to say goodbye to Radio after three years of continuous use and it will take some time to get this to where I want it to be, if I ever actually do with all the other things that I am currently working on.

Carlos Guadian has been kind enough to send me several images of articles covering the conference in Barcelona. I learned a lot while I was there. Particularly, about the state of technology in government in Catalunya, having the opportunity to speak with a significant number of government officials and tech companies that operate in the egov area. Here is one that was published in Data.Ti (click on photo).

Here is a photo blog of my trip to Catalunya.