Issue
Brief
Electronic
Government
Bureau of Information and
Telecommunications
Summary: Today a
E-government is Expected
Citizens
and businesses expect government to be online and accessible 24x7. By building
a secure infrastructure to serve their clients, the state of
Vision Came Out of Necessity
Citizens
and businesses were often confused and unsure of which state agency to contact
to get things done. Several phone calls or visits to state agencies, during
regular office hours, had to occur to find the right agency for help or to get
one of their forms. In January 2001,
some 35% of state forms were only available from a state government office in
paper form.
Instead,
citizens should be able to quickly access all
The
Internet portal concept (an electronic window for direct access to state
services) was deemed the best vehicle to enhance the citizen and business use
of state government forms. The portal needed to serve as one-stop shopping for
all state forms that generate over 8 million transactions annually with
The primary
goal of the Service Direct project is
for the citizen and their businesses to have a successful interaction with
Everyone had a Part to Play
An
E-government Task Force was formed as the conduit for ideas and project work
between the agencies and the central IT organization -- the Bureau of
Information and Telecommunications (BIT). Membership was composed of agency
representatives (to serve as e-government facilitators) and each agency’s BIT
point of contact (chief technology consultant).
The
legislature did its part by authorizing $400,000 for the project. While
seemingly a lot of money, traditional methods of deploying e-government across
all agency forms were estimated to cost $12 million. We realized our
shoe-string budget would necessitate a creative approach to delivering on the
e-government promise. The legislature also removed requirements of notary and
original ink signature in lieu of electronic signatures and added new laws
governing what constitutes a signature.
Our Forms Told a Story
The process
of developing
First, we
learned that a few do the most work. A
half dozen agencies (Department of
Health, Department of Social
Services, Department of Labor,
Department of Revenue, Department
of Education,
Department
of Environment and Natural Resources) have three-fourths of the forms, while a
dozen forms (such as motor vehicle titles and fishing/hunting licenses)
generate more than half of the transactions.
Some 50% of
the forms had less than 100 transactions per year and 80% of the forms were
used less than 1,000 times a year.
While the numbers
may be small, these
dynamics apply across the states.
Knowing the Dynamics, Helped Us
Define a Solution
Identification
of these dynamics and discussions with agency program managers led us to
include the following functionality in Service
Direct:
q
Ability to
download state forms
q
Access to
information about all forms
q
Access to all
online state forms
q
Access to many
state publications
q
Search for
forms by category, agency or keyword
q
Search for
forms by Life Events Timeline (example, forms arranged from Birth through
Senior age groups)
q
Search for
forms by Business Cycle (example, Start, Grow or Run a Business)
q
Search for
forms by Stand Alone Events (example, Find a Job).
Service Direct had to embody these benefits:
q
One-stop shopping for forms – provides
quicker, easier access to state forms.
q
Consolidate all the information about state forms – “three
mouse clicks” to any form’s information, download and online execution,
eliminated the need to go through a state agency web site. The citizen or
business does not have to know the structure of state government to find and
use a form.
q
Faster, cheaper, and more accurate interaction
with state – make state government more effective in delivering
service to
Kept the Solution Simple
After
completing the inventory, high school students, IT programmers, college students
and agency staff put all forms online.
Next, a
portal was developed for all agency forms. Hot links provide access to the most
popular citizen forms. Businesses use the many links provided in the business
cycle section about starting, growing, and running a business. Users can also
select categories of forms, all the forms for an agency, or they can find a
form by keyword search. The portal uses the pop-up window design so that the
user can have the information page and the download or online page available at
the same time.
The most
frequently used button is at the top of the page. The “Access all State
Forms/Pubs” is the fastest path to a given form. Here all state forms are
listed by service category and by agency. One can also search by keyword.
All forms
have an information icon that the user can click on to go directly to the
information page. This page provides a form description and contact
information. The information link also describes who, why, when and how to use
a form. The user may choose the download
icon or the online icon to complete and submit the form.
The
“Lifespan Timeline” captures events the average citizen will encounter or
participate in during their lifetime. This feature provides another way to search
for a form by locating services, along a timeline, that may by used by a
specific age group.
Additionally,
the standalone event buttons can be used for specific actions to recurring
lifetime activities — such as finding a job or dealing with one’s health.
Hot links
are also provided for some of the most popular forms citizens use — these tend
to be seasonal in nature.
For
businesses, the site points you to services for starting, growing and running a
business.
Service Direct requires a user to register the first time into the
site and to enter a login user name and password on subsequent visits. The user is in a secure transaction mode
during this process. The profile
information is voluntary and different for a business than for a citizen. Profile information is used to authenticate
the type of user and will be used to pre-populate form fields. The user can update their profile information
at any time.
Links are Available and Kept
Up-to-Date
Having all
the links in one place enables the state to check for and respond to broken
links immediately since agencies continually maintain their web sites and often
provide links to other related agency sites. The portal also enables the state
to capture statistics on the web pages and perform analysis on form usage.
Other reports provide statistics indicating the effectiveness of this service.
Extensive
efforts are made to provide a web site usable by those with accessibility
needs. We review, grade and report to the agencies on the status of priority 1
and 2 W3C accessibility. Bobby is
used along with manual and WatchFire review of pages. Items that are tracked include:
click through paths (pages viewed); duration of visit; hits (site usage
totals); page of departure; referring page; time of arrival; type of browser;
unique users; user comments/feedback.
Users Like
the Experience
The
As of
September 2003, the portal contains information links on all state forms; has
downloadable copies of all state forms and has nearly three-fourths of all
state forms either doable online or requiring a visit by a state official. 10
of 22 agencies have all their forms doable online.
Our formal satisfaction survey, reachable when the user logs out of the
portal, showed a 2.0 average experience on a scale of l to 4, with l being
excellent.
Unfortunately we only had 96 survey responses over eight months. We went to a
‘smiley face’ satisfaction survey and have received 1081 responses in the last six months. Again the
users rated the site a 2.0 out of 4, with 1 being excellent.
Additional Resources
South
Dakota Codified Law (Electronic Transactions) 53.12 is available via the
Internet:
South
Dakota Codified Laws and Constitution
South
Dakota Codified Law (Identity Theft) 22-30A is available via the Internet:
South
Dakota Codified Laws and Constitution
Brief
videos, explaining Service Direct, are available via the Internet:
http://www.sd.gov
or http://www.state.sd.us
Contacts
Otto Doll
Commissioner,
Bureau of Information and Telecommunications
605-773-5110
Denise
Luckhurst
Development
Director, Bureau of Information and Telecommunications
605-773-4653