At its very best, a village, town or city that invests in providing greater equity and access to government services goes a long way toward closing a gap between the municipality and its citizens. How can technology bring about this level of equity and where does it have the potential to create the most impact?
Ironically, the location of where this meaningful change originates isn’t anywhere you can spot on a map because it’s not a physical location at all: It’s the cloud.
The traditional processes and logistical hoops that some citizens have to jump through can be challenging on many levels.
Let’s take law enforcement as an example. A vehicle is pulled over for speeding and the driver receives a ticket from an officer. Later on, if that driver has to make a court appearance during the day, they may have some significant life juggling to do. Why?
They don’t have a lot of availability to take off time from work for court easily and on top of that, being a parent, they’ve got major childcare questions now. Who will watch their child if they have to appear in court?
Now, let’s contrast that with a more streamlined process that exists in the cloud instead and it’s easy to see how operational efficiency instantly improves. For one, with a cloud-based platform like DACRA Tech’s, the citizen doesn’t need to go directly to circuit court.
Through the software’s process automation, an officer can issue a Local Ordinance eCitation, the citizen can pay the citation and reach a resolution faster online – all of which can be far more seamless than the type of traditional ticket processing that could bottleneck. That kind of government access with efficiency is a win for both the municipality and its citizens.
A Smarter Platform With Well-Maintained Access to Government Services
When we think about what’s traditionally behind the gap between a municipality and its citizens receiving access to services, we have to consider that municipalities aren’t typically known for having the time or resources to be as technologically advanced as a large corporation.
So what happens? To prevent itself from being spread thin even further, the municipality might contract with a local IT resource in town for guidance with security, firewalls and other vital operations. The result can be a more reactive partner to issues than proactive, leading to downtime for technical problems and routine maintenance windows, which creates potential accessibility challenges.
Conversely, a cloud-based platform such as DACRA Tech offers less technical downtime for upgrades and maintenance for security and data privacy, which prevents resources from being drawn away from other vital tasks. And as there is no equipment involved in the maintenance and upkeep of the platform, the municipality experiences substantial cost savings – all without as much of a hiccup in accessibility to the platform.
Every Municipality Needs A 24/7 Relationship With The Community. Shouldn’t Its Technology Reflect That?
One of the biggest advantages of a cloud-based platform is its capability to provide a resident-friendly portal to the community, in turn freeing up staff members to focus on other high-touch administrative functions.
In the case of DACRA Tech, its portal is equipped and continuously evolving to serve a variety of roles for the community, providing fast access to government services at each citizen’s fingertips at any time of day or night:
A centralized hub for alerts and other timely information
A facilitator for law enforcement commerce and communication – online payment reminders, court date assignment reminders, incident submissions, petitions for rescheduling hearings, etc.
A support arm for building – property notices and violations, permit applications, inspection scheduling requests and rental and business license applications.
The more frequently and uniformly a community can have easy access to government services, the stronger that community will be. The cloud can be a vital component of this growth, benefitting the ongoing relationship between the municipality and a large group of residents who feel heard, served and respected.
To see how DACRA Tech can bring an unparalleled efficiency level to your municipality, ask us for a demo today by calling 847.490.8440 or emailing Solutions@Dacratech.com. You may also click the link below to schedule a demo with our sales team.
REQUEST A DEMO OF OUR PERMITTING SOFTWARE FOR GOVERNMENTS
We pride ourselves on the strong relationships we build with our clients. This allows us to delve deeply into workflows so that we can create perfect training programs and achieve rapid onboarding. Implementation can often be accomplished in a matter of a few weeks.