Digital Services
Online utility payments, tax remittance, business licenses, digital forms and e-signatures — state and local governments are moving more and more paper-based services to the Internet. Includes coverage of agencies modernizing and digitizing processes such as pet registration, permitting, motor vehicle registration and more.
An auditing proposal once on hold is moving forward, officials said, and a new contract will enable them to scan ballots cast with text-recognition software. Training and preparations for a post-election audit are underway.
The agency has reopened phone lines on Mondays and said it has made headway on matters that have held up jobless claims and paid leave benefits. The department went live earlier this year with a new $106 million computer system.
After a customer survey revealed 70 percent of respondents did not have broadband, the Lewis County Public Utility District recently made the first links in a grant-funded, fiber-to-the-premises broadband network.
One, in Red Oak, is a 480-megawatt data center campus on 292 acres. Construction is underway. A second, roughly $1 billion data center project on 60 acres near the Bush Turnpike got city economic incentives last week.
The utility ComEd is working with Illinois nonprofit QUILT to improve middle-mile broadband infrastructure across Chicago’s South and West sides while reducing costs. The initiative is enabled by a federal grant.
The Gopher State is finding Internet service providers are not applying for the grants because of regulations that would come along. These include having to provide low-cost services to low-income households.
A lawsuit filed against a property management software firm has elected officials in the Silicon Valley city considering how to protect renters. Three councilmembers have proposed an ordinance to ban rent or occupancy-setting tools.
Years after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, many people in Deschutes County still choose to attend court dates remotely. The county moved to electronic filing in 2015, with video technology emerging around the same time.
Officials in the consolidated city-county of Butte-Silver Bow are investigating issues that led to a recount after the June 4 primary. Computer software safeguards are among potential corrective measures, the county clerk and recorder said.
The New Hampshire Secretary of State said officials found and had a forensic expert take out a Ukrainian anthem alert that had been inserted into a voter registration database in development. The project went live in April, months later.
