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Worcester, MA (July 11, 2003)
BY HAROLD GUSHUE
WORCESTER TELEGRAM & GAZETTE
STURBRIDGE - The town's Web site is rated in eighth place among the 166 communities that have municipal sites. It is rated in first place among communities of less than 20,000 population and is also the top-rated site in Worcester County.
Westboro placed 16th in the overall category and ranked second among Worcester County communities. Worcester placed third in the Worcester County category while Auburn and Northboro placed fourth and fifth respectively in the category.
The research and ratings were compiled in January by Public Sphere Information Group of Newtonville. It notes that 47 percent of the 361 communities have some sort of municipal Web site while 157 of 232 or 68 percent of communities under 15,000 population are without municipal sites.
Town Administrator James J. Malloy said the town site allows downloading forms for building and other permits and contact with any department. He said people can also provide their e-mail address to receive public notices.
Residents are not able to pay any bills on line, he said, because of "the whole issue with the credit card surcharges." That refers to a service charge the card companies impose on stores or others who accept credit card payments.
The town of 8,500 people spends $5,000 a year on its site, for internet access and hosting services. It has no full-time person or Webmaster to oversee the site.
Individual departments are responsible for keeping their site information, Mr. Malloy said. "I regularly check everybody's Web site to make sure they're keeping them up-to-date." He said he also offers assistance and holds meetings on what can and should be provided on the town site.
In comparison, Boston, which was rated as the tope site by PSI, spends about $13 million for its electronic information services, said Craig D. Burlingame, chief information officer for the city. He said the city has seven people who work fulltime as a Web group. "We're doing more every day," he said. While some bills can be paid through the site, the city does not accept real estate or personal property tax payments online because of the percentage charged by credit card companies. The city population is about 589,000.
He said not all seven employees work on just the main municipal site which also provides links to neighborhood associations and other groups. He said the city also maintains the Boston Youth Zone site, which features specific programming offers for youths.
Raj Pareek, manager of electronic government services for the city, is responsible for implementing programs for the site. He said people can pay parking tickets, motor vehicle excise taxes, apply for licenses online and get information about various city agencies.
Mr. Burlingame noted the main site is "oriented to residents, businesses and visitors. We do all three major categories.
Ben Vivante is Webmaster for the Brookline municipal Web site which serves about 60,000 residents. He said people can pay parking tickets, property taxes on line as well as water and sewer bills and also enroll for various recreation activities. He said the town is working on allowing payment of motor vehicle excise taxes.
He said the assessors office has a property data base which includes photographs of the properties. The site also offers an interactive Geographic Information Systems site through which various maps can be downloaded. Neighborhood associations are listed on the site.
While he does not know how much is spent in maintaining the site, he said his salary is $55,000. "I'm the first Webmaster that the town has had," he said.
Charles H. Kaylor, president and chief executive officer for PSI, said of the survey "Our methodology is outside looking in." He said in only a few instances were municipalities contacted.
He said it is the first such survey PSI has done in Massachusetts, although it has done similar national surveys of cities of more than 100,000 population.
He also noted that getting "any kind of concrete numbers" for electronic government expenses is hard because "typically e-government is not a line item in anybody's budget."
He noted that "For the most part there's a real cutoff between larger and smaller communities as to what they can afford to put up." He said the population cutoff range for such major differences is about 20,000-25,000 people.
He said there are some instances of smaller communities offering services beyond what would normally be expected. "Sturbridge comes to mind" he said, as did Concord and Franklin. "There were a couple of pleasant surprises."
He said e-government services is still new and the real question is how it will change how cities and towns go about their business.
The rankings of Worcester County communities with Web sites from first to last is: Sturbridge, Westboro, Worcester, Auburn, Northboro, Shrewsbury, Charlton, Princeton, Holden, Fitchburg, Oxford, Southbridge, Upton, North Brookfield, Leominster, Milford, Templeton, Mendon, Barre,Gardner and Leicester.
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