Plans for Improvement, Growth of California County E-Government

At a County Board of Supervisors meeting Tuesday, Sacramento Chief of E-Government Diane Hartline outlined future projects, and trends in the E-Government arena. Taking into account ideas such as the increased amount of page hits and the growth of the E-Government department Hartline advised the supervisors that "any function of Sacramento County government that can be made available online should be available online."

Some of the future plans include implementation of a county wide 211/311 program, an E-subscribe page which allows people to sign up for alerts, including emergency alerts, and the creation of an E-Pay site where residents can pay for licenses and other county fees all in one place.

An important trend discussed was the so called millennial generation, those people born from 1985-2000 who have just or will soon become of voting age. Hartline explained that this generation "sees things in an entirely different way" -- not only have they always been exposed to technology, but they use online/computer technology in daily life.

Of those of the millennial generation:

• 87 percent use internet home
• 44 percent are online everyday
• 29 percent use multiple simultaneous instant messaging (IM)
• 25 percent instant message(IM) people in same room

Because of this, the next generation expects to have easy access to E-Government.

The basic issue which Hartline wished to make clear was that as government officials the supervisors should always ask the question: "Can we put it Online?"