Citizen Services

Mobile Version Of Federal Budget Draws Surprising Viewership

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The U.S. Government Printing Office reports that the mobile application it developed for this year’s release of the 2013 Federal Budget proposal to Congress drew 53,000 visits in the first 24 hours of being posted — a surprising volume given the arcane nature and scope of the annual budget document.

The GPO application, available at http://m.gpo.gov/budget, features mobile friendly text versions of the president’s budget message, along with additional commentaries on building the economy, cutting waste, reducing the deficit and investing in the future. Keep reading →

 /  Published February 15, 2012 at 11:35 AM

Election Districts Enfranchise Overseas Voters With Help From The Cloud

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There are few aspects of modern life that haven’t been touched by information technology. One of them is the voting process for U.S. overseas military personnel. For the most part, it’s still done by snail mail. A soldier abroad receives a ballot by mail, marks it manually and returns it by mail.

“We’ve been doing this since the 1860s,” said Paul Lux, supervisor of elections for Okaloosa County in northwest Florida. But that’s in the process of changing. Keep reading →

 /  Published February 10, 2012 at 2:57 PM

Senate Cybersecurity Bill Could Revive Kill Switch, Crush Innovation

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COMMENTARY – Some lawmakers on Capitol Hill are hell bent on implementing the recommendations of President Barack Obama’s Cyberspace Policy Review, in which the administration argued for a greater role for the Department of Homeland Security in securing the nation’s critical infrastructure from cyber attack.

And to prove how serious and misguided they are, some of these lawmakers like Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-CT) and Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) are about to introduce legislation that arguably will hurt innovation and jobs, and which may actually grant the DHS extraordinary regulatory powers that extend to the Internet. Keep reading →

 /  Published February 9, 2012 at 10:35 AM

CIA’s World Factbook: Intelligence For Every Thinker, Traveler, Soldier, Spy

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The Government Printing Office has just recently released its latest edition of the CIA’s World Factbook–which marks its 50th anniversary in 2012 for the classified version and more than 40 years of publishing the public version.

The 810-page public edition of the CIA’s World Factbook provides not only a timely and valuable source of global information, it also allows us a glimpse into the times and events that necessitated its production. Keep reading →

 /  Published February 2, 2012 at 8:09 AM

DHS Secretary Unveils New National Strategy For Supply Chain Security

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Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano unveiled the Obama administration’s latest “National Strategy for Global Supply Chain Security” today at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
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This story was updated Jan. 26 to reflect additional expert comments. For more news and insights on innovations at work in government, please sign up for the AOL Gov newsletter. For the quickest updates, follow us on Twitter @AOLgov.
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“We must continue to strengthen global supply chains to ensure that they operate effectively in time of crisis; recover quickly from disruptions; and facilitate international trade and travel,” said Secretary Napolitano in a statement released today by DHS. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 25, 2012 at 3:02 PM

GSA Makes Great E-Gov Strides

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The General Services Administration’s main website (gsa.gov) has seen a dramatic 18-point improvement in citizen satisfaction since the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) began measuring federal website approval ratings in 2003.

The index, measured every quarter with the latest released on Thursday, showed that GSA scored 74 points in the fourth quarter of 2011, up from 56 when ACSI began taking the temperature of customer satisfaction with federal government websites. Overall report results indicate Americans are more satisfied with services provided by the U.S. federal government than they were a year ago. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 19, 2012 at 12:02 AM

Report Indicates E-Gov Continues Upswing

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Americans are more satisfied with services provided by the U.S. federal government than they were a year ago, according to a report released today by the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI).

ACSI results show that citizen satisfaction with federal government is up 2.3% to 66.9 (on a 0-100 scale) for 2011. The improvement, however, comes on the heels of a large decline for federal services, when citizen satisfaction tumbled nearly 5% to 65.4 between 2009 and 2010. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 19, 2012 at 12:01 AM

App Allows Virtual Tour Through Library Of Congress

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The Library of Congress – Virtual Tour App allows users to get a tour of the Library of Congress at anytime and from anywhere.

The app, available for the iPhone, gives users access to hundreds of pictures of the Library including pictures of the main reading room or its collection on important documents which founded the United States, according to the Mobile Gov Blog. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 17, 2012 at 11:00 AM

GSA’s Energy Usage Analysis System Illustrates Data.gov’s Limitations

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I recently was involved in a discussion debating the successes of Open Government.


Some of the individuals in the discussion felt the success of the Open Government initiative was the creation of Data.gov, but I disagreed saying that it was only a data catalog and even the featured data sets are difficult to use and understand.

We really need data apps and data stories from those that the public and decision-makers could use to justify funding and claim success.

The 25 most popular apps at Data.gov were mostly XML feeds and only 5 were Excel that I could easily make into data apps. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 4, 2012 at 7:25 AM

How To Simplify Benefits Website For Veterans

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I recently looked at the Veterans eBenefits portal and couldn’t help but conclude that it was overwhelmingly complex and needed a make over. One approach to reducing that complexity is to digitally mine the web site for its business processes and data sets and then integrating them. That would both improve the user experience and save the agency/taxpayer money.


That’s not the only approach, but it is a timely one in light of a recent story on the overgrowth of federal web sites talked about the “State of the Federal Web Report,” released Dec. 16 by a government task force. The report represented the first comprehensive review of federal websites, following the Obama administration conclusion earlier this year that there were simply too many government websites.

The report also highlighted findings from interactions with the public, which led to hundreds of suggestions for ways to improve users’ experience with federal websites. I found there were simply too many web pages with too many options and links at the Veterans and eBenefits Portal for even me to follow, let alone our veterans, their families, and service members. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 3, 2012 at 1:01 PM
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