2014 Local Government CIO Summit

1. EVANSTON
ILLINOIS
2014 Local Government CIO Summit
Nashville, TN
Jose Calderon, IT Division Manager
Luke Stowe, Digital Services Coordinator
September 29, 2014

2. ABOUT EVANSTON, IL
• Population: About 75,000
• Home of Northwestern University
• Just north of City of Chicago

3. ABOUT JOSE
• IT Division Manager
• Leads a team of 10 IT members
• Evanston resident

4. SUCCESS FACTORS
• Support of City Manager and City Council
• Camaraderie Among IT Team
• Relationship with City Manager’s Office,
Community Engagement Team
• Shared Services – NU & Gov. Agencies
• IT Cabinet

5. IT PROJECTS
• Yelp & Accela
• Health Inspections & Texting
• BYOD & Virtual Desktops

6. ABOUT LUKE
• Digital Services Coordinator
• Previously with Lake & Champaign Counties (IL)
• City Manager’s Office (Wally)
• Flexibility Work, Space, Time Shifting

7. EXCITING TIME IN LOCAL GOV
• SaaS (Software as a Service)
- Splash (Fleetwood Jourdain Theatre)
- SurveyMonkey
- GovDelivery
• APIs (Application Programming Interface)
- Wufoo & Stripe
- Junar & PublicStuff

8. ONLINE PAYMENTS (NO MORE LINES)
• Stripe
- Powering dozens of online forms now
- Low rates due to high volume (2.0%)
• Dwolla (eCheck)
- Adding as an option for online payments –
only $0.25 per transaction
• Amazon Local Register
- In-person transaction such as Collector’s Office

9. CODE FOR AMERICA PROJECTS
•Open Data Formats
•Open Referral, Open Trail, GTFS and LIVES
(Local Inspector Value Entry Specification) –
will feed to Yelp
•GTFS (General Transit Feed Specification) –
PACE & CTA already, working on METRA

10. PARKS, RECREATION, & COMMUNITY
SERVICES APP
• Launching Android & Apple apps in October
• Built in-house for greater control and more
affordable, easier to make changes
• Around Me, Calendar, Push Notifications,
Listing of Parks and Amenities

11. SMS/TEXTING & WEB CHAT TO 311
• 311 now handling nearly 4,000 chats
• We’ve already received dozens of SMS text
in the first couple of weeks with limited
promotion
• Subtle difference between web chats and
SMS text messages
• Call/Text Us at (847) 448-4311

12. SOCIAL MEDIA
• Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn
• Pinterest, Instagram, Google+
• Snapchat? Other platforms?

13. NEW CITY WEBSITE
• Last overhaul of city website was 2010,
looking to launch new site in spring 2015
• Building cutting edge site leveraging
responsive design, improved site search,
and easy content editing for staff
•Wordpress – already powering several sites
including our intranet

14. THANK YOU!
Jose Calderon – jcalderon@cityofevanston.org
Luke Stowe – lstowe@cityofevanston.org