menu
Archived Government Notes
Published in 2020
Permanent URL
San Jose Invests in Smart City Tech as a Force Multiplier
by calvin hennick
With a population of just over 1 million people, San Jose is the tenth-largest city in the United States, and yet Mayor Sam Liccardo says the city has the most “thinly staffed” government of any major metropolis in the country. That combination of big city and small staff is part of the reason officials have enthusiastically embraced innovation to improve city services.
“There’s some irony here,” says Liccardo, who first took office in 2015. “We have the most innovative community on the planet outside our door in Silicon Valley. The challenge is that inside City Hall, we are the most thinly staffed of any major city in the country, due to a host of fiscal challenges. I saw innovation as an imperative because we just didn’t have a sufficient number of human resources to provide services effectively to our community.”
That doesn’t mean city officials say yes to every project that comes their way. Earlier this year, Vice Mayor Charles “Chappie” Jones announced the new Innovation Zone that will be used as a sandbox of sorts to test out emerging technologies, and the city has partnered with technology companies for pilot projects. But for tech that will have a long-term impact on core city services, officials are focused on proven solutions.
Read full story at StateTech…
first published week of: 07/13/2020
Permanent URL
San Jose Launches New Innovation Zone with More Partners and Focus
by phil goldstein
The city at the heart of Silicon Valley hopes this initiative will succeed where others haven’t, thanks to resident input and scalable solutions.
In January, San Jose, Calif., unveiled plans for a new innovation zone in a neighborhood on the west side of the city, the third time it has tried to launch such a zone in the past six years. However, city officials think this effort will succeed and scale up due to a change in focus.
As the San Jose Business Journal reports, in 2014, the city launched the Transportation Innovation Zone in North San Jose, and later opened a similar zone available to the entire city. Neither of those efforts were successful, the publication notes.
According to Dolan Beckel, director of the Office of Civic Innovation and Digital Strategy in San Jose, this time around the city is making the innovation zone “people-driven” and focused on real-world problems. The new program incorporates the efforts of multiple stakeholders, he says, including private real estate developers, technology companies, residents and city government officials.
Read full story at StateTech…
first published week of: 03/02/2020
Permanent URL
Secret Service Creates New Cyber Fraud Task Force, Merging Two Task Forces
by Kate Polit
As cyber and financial crimes become increasingly intertwined, the Secret Service announced that it is merging its Electronic Crimes Task Force and Financial Crimes Task Force into a single task force, which will be known as the Cyber Fraud Task Force.
The new task force’s mission is to “prevent, detect, and mitigate complex cyber-enabled financial crimes, with the ultimate goal of arresting and convicting the most harmful perpetrators,” said the Secret Service, in a July 9 statement.
The creation of the new Cyber Fraud Task Force (CFTF), will offer a specialized cadre of agents and analysts, trained in the latest analytical techniques and equipped with the most cutting-edge technologies Secret Service Assistant Director Michael D’Ambrosio
Like most of the Federal government, the Secret Service has pivoted to focus the COVID-19 pandemic. Since March, the Secret Service has focused its investigative efforts on “disrupting and deterring criminal activity that could hinder an effective response to the pandemic and to recover stolen funds from Americans.” The Secret Service says that the new task force allows for better data sharing, institutional alliance, and investigative skill development.
“The creation of the new Cyber Fraud Task Force (CFTF), will offer a specialized cadre of agents and analysts, trained in the latest analytical techniques and equipped with the most cutting-edge technologies,” said Secret Service Assistant Director Michael D’Ambrosio in a statement. “Together with our partners, the CFTFs stand ready to combat the full range of cyber-enabled financial crimes. As the nation continues to grapple with the wave of cybercrime associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, the CFTFs will lead the effort to hold accountable all those who seek to exploit this perilous moment for their own illicit gain.”
Read full story at MeriTalk…
first published week of: 07/20/2020
Permanent URL
Smart City Testbeds Are a Vital Part of Building Useful Tech
by Skip Descant
Officials from the public, private and nonprofit sectors discussed the need for community testbeds to explore and grow smart city technologies at scale during the recent Smart Cities Connect Conference.
Testing and growing technologies to support advancements as lofty as drone deliveries and community broadband are some of the initiatives being explored with smart city testbeds.
It’s not hard to sell a community on the benefits of smart city technologies and the concept of connectivity Joe Kochan, CEO for US Ignite
Carving out a small piece of the “real world” to explore new technologies is at the root of the testbed concept. It’s why these test sites have been set up in a number of communities, spearheaded by city leaders, the private sector and nonprofits.
It’s not hard to sell a community on the benefits of smart city technologies and the concept of connectivity, said Joe Kochan, CEO for US Ignite, a tech nonprofit charged with bolstering smart communities.
“It is very hard to get them from a vision for that future to all of the difficult plumbing steps that have to go. And that’s why we think these at-scale, these real-world testbeds, can be so important,” said Kochan, speaking at the Smart Cities Connect Conference and Expo on a panel devoted to testbeds.
Read full story at GovTech…
first published week of: 11/16/2020
Permanent URL
St. Louis to Add 1,400 Tech Jobs With AFS Advanced Technology Center
by cailin crowe
The Advanced Technology Center will create 200 new jobs within the first year, AFS CEO John Goodman said at a Tuesday press conference, and comes at a time when Missouri is grappling with a 13.3% statewide unemployment rate.
"Missouri is already recognized as one of the most prepared states for the digital economy, and at a time when many Missourians are looking for work, this move will create more opportunity, grow our technology workforce, and strengthen our standing as a technology hub in the U.S," Missouri Gov. Mike Parson said in a statement.
The new center also adds to St. Louis’ smart city offerings. In May 2020, St. Louis became the first Midwest city to pass a Building Energy Performance Standard (BEPS) in an effort to eliminate the city’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050. As part of that standard, buildings 50,000 square feet or larger will be required to perform a series of energy-saving actions. The building sector is responsible for about 80% of the city’s GHG emissions.
Read full story at Smart Cities Dive…
first published week of: 06/29/2020
Permanent URL
State and Local Agencies Learn Cloud Strategies from the Feds
by david egts
Government agencies turn to the federal government for guidance on accelerating cloud adoption.
David Egts is the Chief Technologist of Red Hat’s North America Public Sector organization. At the intersection between public sector customers and Red Hat engineering and product management, his customer interactions and domain expertise blend customer needs with industry trends to help Red Hat define open-source computing in the enterprise.
When state and local agencies see federal government cloud strategies, it may appear moving everything to the cloud — infrastructure, applications, desktops, data and more — is too daunting, too confusing and too expensive. That has the potential to be true if there’s no structure applied to the process. But that begs the questions, how can we apply that structure? Where do we even start?
Federal agencies have already started. You just need to learn from their concepts to make them your own and absorb the lessons they’ve learned the hard way about what it means to work with the cloud.
Read full story at StateTech…
first published week of: 02/24/2020
Permanent URL
Study Finds States Widely Vary on Ability to Guard Against Cyber Attacks
by Tom Temin
Last year, when Baltimore’s municipal functions basically came to a halt, it highlighted the cybersecurity challenges at the non-federal level. The truth is, the ability and skill in staying cyber safe varies widely across state and local governments. That’s the finding of a detailed study by BlueVoyant. With more, BlueVoyant’s head of incident response, and former FBI special agent, Austin Berglas joined Federal Drive with Tom Temin.
Interview transcript:
Read full story at Federal News Network…
first published week of: 09/14/2020
Permanent URL
Tennessee GIS Director Receives National Award
Dennis Pedersen, a 27-year state employee, was chosen for the Champion Award from the National States Geographic Information Council (NSGIC), an organization promoting the use of GIS and other data for government service.
“Geospatial technology is now being used to improve state resource management, promote more effective and efficient business decisions, and improve the quality of life for Tennessee citizens,” Pedersen said.
NSGIC noted Pedersen’s work to collect, process and disseminate accurate LiDAR data across the state. LiDAR, which stands for Light Detection and Ranging, is a surveying method that uses laser to help generate precise, three-dimensional information about surface characteristics in Tennessee.
Read full story at Tennesse Dept of Finance & Administration…
first published week of: 10/05/2020
Permanent URL
Tennessee to Deploy New Smart Highway System
by phil goldstein
The I-40 Smart Fiber Project is designed to improve driver safety and lay the foundation for autonomous vehicles.
For several years, city and state governments have been deploying a variety of smart roadway technologies to improve safety and ease traffic congestion, as well as to build a foundation for connected vehicle technology, including vehicle-to-infrastructure connectivity. In Tennessee, the state is aiming to do all of that.
In June, the Tennessee Department of Transportation announced it had been awarded a $11.2 million federal Infrastructure for Rebuilding America grant. TDOT will match the grant with its own funds to deploy the I-40 Smart Fiber Project, which will expand Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) technologies along Interstate 40 between Memphis and Nashville.
The project is currently under development, with construction expected to begin in late 2021. Brad Freeze, TDOT’s traffic operations division director, says there are big goals for the initiative.
Read full story at StateTech…
first published week of: 08/03/2020
Permanent URL
Text-to-911 Saves Lives, but Data Suggests It Remains Rare
by Ben Miller
Data on the availability of text-to-911 is spotty, so it's difficult to get a consistent national picture. However, the numbers that are available show that some states are far more advanced than others.
A man who was high on heroin and wanted by police came to his sister’s daycare center. A group of deaf people became stranded in the middle of a large lake when their boat’s motor died. A woman was kidnapped by a trucker at a rest stop, sexually assaulted and then left in the back of his cab as he drove.
These are all real stories, and in each situation the people involved either couldn’t call 911 or would have put themselves in jeopardy by doing so.
So instead, they texted. The police came to take the woman’s brother into custody, bring the boaters back to shore, arrest the truck driver and rescue his victim.>
Read full story at GovTech…
first published week of: 04/20/2020