Control of the New York State Senate has been a bitter fight the past several years. With the number of Democratic and Republican seats being one close, control of the Senate has shifted by buying off individual legislators. After the 2010 elections in Oregon, the state legislature ended in a 30 to 30 tie betweenRead… Read more »
In 2006, the Buffalo Common Council unanimously approved an amendment to the City Charter which created a Procurement Policy Board. Byron Brown, in the early days of his first term as mayor, signed the local law to create the Procurement Policy Board. Brown touted how the board could streamline city purchasing and save the cityRead… Read more »
blightSTATUS is an online tool that aims to answer the question, “What’s going on with that abandoned house down the street?” Vacant and abandoned properties have become a huge problem for many cities. The story is clear: these properties drain city resources and cast a shadow over a neighborhood’s progress and quality of life. TheRead… Read more »
Following up on yesterday’s election, a member of our team asked me to write up some thoughts around the meaning of citizenship and democracy. We talk often not only how our work is about government and not politics and how we’re trying just as hard to reinvent citizenship as much as bureaucracy. But what doesRead… Read more »
Post Highlights GovLoop releases new report: Identifying the Promise of GIS for Government GIS offers benefits to those looking to improve social services, public health, and urban renewal GIS helps better understand a problem’s context, make better informed decisions, and to collaborate across agencies in implementing solutions The GovLoop report, Identifying the Promise of GISRead… Read more »
I thought the infographic below (and associated blog post) might be of interest to Govloop subscribers. We have created the infographic below for local government. Like many organisations across other industries, local governments have started to use social media cautiously in recent years. Too often, local governments only consider social media as an outbound communicationRead… Read more »
By Sam Williford, Associate Consultant Starting last week, and into the forseeable future, every level of government was called upon to work together to prepare for and clean up after Hurricane Sandy, which struck the area this past week. The recent disagreements between New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and Atlantic City Mayor Lorenzo Langford highlightRead… Read more »
Welcome to GovLoop InsightsIssue of the Week with Chris Dorobek where each week, our goal is to find an issue — a person — an idea — then helped define the past 7-days and we work to find an issue that will also will have an impact on the days, weeks and months ahead. And,Read… Read more »
Recently we collaborated with the Smart Cities institute to conduct a worldwide telepresence seminar at the Cisco offices, discussing ‘Gigabit Cities’ – Open Government, Big Data and Innovation. Our partners Sandel and Associates have been working with Kansas City to develop economic development strategies, and one key initiative for the city has been a dealRead… Read more »
The City Council in Buffalo and the Erie County Legislature spend a great deal of time on constituent concerns and proclamations honoring various individuals and community groups. As such very little time if any is spent on setting goals and measuring the performance of government departments. In an effort to encourage big picture thinking, IRead… Read more »