Government Technology

The creation of a new countywide information management system will be a "watershed moment."

At the pace it’s going, Xerox Corp. will be six years past its renegotiated deadline by the time it completes an $84 million state contract for a new computer program to manage Medicaid payments, according to an audit of the project.

State regulators should consider how they can unlock additional data sets to enable the development of sophisticated choice engines that help consumers make wiser purchasing decisions in economic areas where the market lacks transparency.

Government IT chiefs react to looming retirements and tech changes.

From how much a community spends on police equipment to the amount of a check written to a contractor building the new fire station, more details of a city’s budget are moving from paper or clunky software to sophisticated Web applications — marking an information revolution that could lead to better government.

Some of the examples include: transportation expenses overstated by about $220 million, capital grants and contributions for Natural Resources understated by $445 million and transfers of about $47.8 million which were omitted entirely.

"Cities today are the engines of the greatest surge in innovation, creativity and problem solving in human history … and cities that think of themselves as platforms will become stronger, attract better talent and become smarter from the bottom up."

Governments and vendors can learn a lot from each other. The procurement process ought to start long before the RFPs are issued.

Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York and Chicago are among a host of localities attempting to process data within the same framework as water or any other natural resource — and it seems to be working.

The public can sign up for email alerts whenever a state employee uses a credit card at Starbucks or writes a check to Staples.