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As city leaders know, today's connected citizens expect much more from their government in terms of convenient, efficient and fast delivery of services than ever before, whether it's getting a building permit or reporting a pothole. It's something...
Article - 08/04/2016
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity, Data management
It was easy for Illinois to end up in its current situation. Ending up with one of the worst technology platforms of any state didn’t require any effort at all.But even if you’re 40 years behind the times, you shouldn’t give up. Illinois has decided...
Article - 05/04/2016
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Policy and leadership
In a lot of cities, open data isn’t very open. The data may be available, but those who want to use it have to poke around what are often complicated websites to identify exactly the right data set and find their analytical tools that can make sense...
Article - 02/05/2016
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Analytics, Citizen engagement, Computing resources
GE has just set up a demonstration street light in New York that talks to passers-by. Yes, it's a bit of a gimmick — in actual deployments, the street lights will talk to your smartphone, not to you in person.But it's a valuable gimmick. First, it's...
Article - 12/01/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Interoperability, Examples and case studies
In making an investment in a new city initiative, it’s easy to focus on the financial aspects: how much it costs and how much it’s likely to save. A growing number of cities and even some technology companies are finding there’s something even more...
Article - 09/11/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Policy and leadership
(L-R) Pratap Padode, Founder & Director, Smart Cities Council India; Kalyani Patil, Mayor, KDMC; E Ravendiran, Commissioner, KDMC; Apeksha Patil, Mayor, Ulhasnagar Municipal corporation; Praful Shah, President, MCHI-Kalyan DombiviliSmart...
Article - 08/28/2015
Active Region(s): India
Category: Built environment, Economic development, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Policy frameworks and tools, Visioning and roadmapping tools
Long lines, the possibility of being turned away at a polling station, old equipment and other problems continue to plague the voting process around the world. But it doesn't have to be that way. One company is working to make voting simpler, more...
Article - 08/14/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity
Imagine a day where people could instantly harness and interact with the abundance of data around them. What if a bus stop became a source of real-time departure updates? Or if a pothole on your walk to work became a platform for good citizen...
Article - 07/17/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Built environment, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity
Everybody wants to talk when things are going well, but a new report on smart cities successes uncovers some valuable insights by looking deeper at the underachievers. One key lesson: forgetting who your smart cities initiatives are for will put you...
Article - 06/24/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Analytics, Citizen engagement, Computing resources
When talking about smart cities, it’s easy to get caught up in the technical wizardry. But Schneider Electric's Charbel Aoun says the real story is what it actually does for people.Schneider Electric is a Council Lead Partner. Aoun, its president...
Article - 06/17/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Analytics, Citizen engagement, Computing resources
It wasn’t all that long ago that 311 programs -- programs that made accessing some government services as easy as calling for emergency assistance -- used to be something only the largest cities could offer. But a shift to cloud computing has made...
Article - 06/05/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources
"Mobile first!" is the catch phrase for many tech companies these days, and for many cities. More and more people are accessing the world through their smartphones rather than their personal computers. Since the mobile interface is more constrained...
Article - 06/03/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Telecommunications, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity
Most agree smartphone apps can help people in a host of ways and even build stronger connections between citizens and their government. But they do require an investment.A new report from Council Lead Partner IBM can help give you an idea whether...
Article - 05/29/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Telecommunications, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity, Data management
Snow rarely falls in Atlanta, so when it did, the media was so busy covering the impacts downtown that suburbs got lost in the flurries. That’s when one discovered the power of social media.The Johns Creek Police Department used technology from...
Article - 05/27/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Public safety and security, Citizen engagement, Computing resources
The Internet of Things (IoT) is already transforming homes and cities by giving people access to real-time data that they can immediately act upon. But factories are now starting to catch on, too.That transformation could pay off for cities, but...
Article - 04/10/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Economic development, Citizen engagement, Computing resources
When cities ask me to boil down my advice to a word or two, I often answer "multi-purpose." Cities need to leverage their investments so they buy once and use many times. This is true for their physical infrastructure. And it is true for their...
Article - 03/25/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Transportation, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity, Interoperability
It’s a common complaint: U.S. companies say they have lots of jobs available, they just can’t find anyone qualified to do it. President Barack Obama hopes to address that with a sweeping new initiative that stretches from the federal government to...
Article - 03/13/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Economic development, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Policy and leadership
A city in southwest England will soon be covered by a wireless umbrella designed to connect everything, allowing enterprising researchers to find new uses for the data that’s generated. The goal is to turn the city of Bristol into a hotbed of smart...
Article - 03/13/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Analytics, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity, Interoperability, SCC Spotlight Cities
Can you imagine if people cut their power lines the way they have been cutting the cord with their cable television providers? Between distributed energy generation, conservation and other advances, that scenario isn’t quite as farfetched as it...
Article - 02/25/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Payments, Citizen engagement, Computing resources
This year the city of Leavenworth, Kansas, polled its citizens twice. The first time city leaders asked for community input on seasonal public services such as the leaf pickup and snow removal programs. The second poll solicited feedback on the city...
Article - 12/19/2014
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity, Citizen engagement strategies and tools
Scroll down for short takes from Council members…S&C Electric and Space-Time Insight win innovation awards: Council Lead Partner S&C Electric Co. won the Energy Storage category in the 2014 Fierce Innovation Awards competition. Winners were...
Article - 11/05/2014
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Energy, Citizen engagement, Computing resources
Often people think of "the cloud" as a massive data repository somewhere online where email and documents are stored for easy access. But the cloud is much more than that, and government agencies around the world are finding the cloud can help them...
Article - 10/01/2014
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Payments, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity, Data management
A growing number of cities are finding they can make significant livability improvements literally overnight.They’re doing it with hackers. While “hackers” often get a bad rap in news stories about data breaches, the term actually refers to anyone...
Article - 06/18/2014
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity
HandUp, a young San Francisco company that uses crowd-funding to help the homeless, won top honors in the smart cities sector of the first annual Challenge Cup, a business competition hosted by Washington, D.C.-based startup hub 1776.Launched last...
Article - 05/21/2014
Active Region(s): Main, North America, Compassionate Cities
Category: Shelter, Health and human services, Transportation, Citizen engagement, Computing resources
New York City kicked off its fifth Big Apps challenge this week with a special plea from Mayor Bill de Blasio that entrants develop ways to reduce traffic fatalities in the city. Toward that end, the city released a database of all traffic...
Article - 05/09/2014
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Public safety and security, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity, Policy and leadership
Organizers say the second National Day of Civic Hacking already has more than 100 events scheduled around the world and expects thousands of participants to show up to help turn data sets from local and federal agencies into impactful, technology-...
Article - 05/07/2014
Active Region(s): Main
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity
Q&A with Laura Ipsen, Microsoft Corporate Vice President, Worldwide Public SectorLaura Ipsen leads a team of nearly 2,000 sales and marketing professionals operating in more than 100 countries to serve government, education and public healthcare...
Article - 11/13/2013
Active Region(s): Main, North America
Category: Smart City Concepts, Citizen engagement, Computing resources
Code for America is a Peace Corps-style non-profit that encourages coders and designers to take a year off to develop applications for government. The young-but-already-successful organization has a variety of initiatives in the works. But for the...
Article - 10/02/2013
Active Region(s): Main
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources
Mayor Rahm Emmanuel gave his CTO John Tolva a mission when he took office. "[He] told me, 'I want Chicago to be the Seoul, Korea of North America,'" said Tolva as quoted in a story in Crain's Chicago Business. And now Tolva has a roadmap to get him...
Article - 09/25/2013
Active Region(s): Main
Category: Economic development, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity, Data management, Policy and leadership
To become a modern, transparent and competitive European city, the city of Zagreb, Croatia, improved its business processes and communication with citizens by partnering with Council Lead Partner Microsoft and Omega Software. This video explains...
Resources - 07/27/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America, Readiness Guide Online
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources
Corporate Review interviews Imex Systems CEO Damodar Arapakota and Aldis Levalds, Director of Business Development, on the company's next-generation smart government technologies that help cities optimize and automate processes for...
Resources - 07/01/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America, Readiness Guide Online
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity
This video explains how CivicConnect™ Mobile from Council Associate Partner Civic Resource Group International enables rapid deployment of dynamic mobile websites and applications for smart government on the go.
Resources - 06/14/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America, Readiness Guide Online
Category: Telecommunications, Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity
New Taipei city government began constructing and integrating the public cloud and service cloud, not only to strengthen city government operations and that of its subordinate agencies, but also to determine public sentiment regarding government...
Resources - 04/17/2015
Active Region(s): Main, North America, Readiness Guide Online
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity, Examples and case studies
Citizens today demand a higher level of customer service, including the ability to access their government with the tools they use every day. Watch this video from Council Lead Partner Microsoft to learn how Citizen Service Request Solutions, built...
Resources - 11/05/2014
Active Region(s): Main, North America, Readiness Guide Online
Category: Citizen engagement, Computing resources, Connectivity