The City of Denton, TWU and UNT

        Creating a Civic Information System

        By Mark Thacker, CWIS Coordinator (thacker@unt.edu)

        Many of you probably read about the City of Denton and how it was providing access to the Internet for the Citizens of Denton in recent articles in the Denton Record Chronicle. While accurate in spirit, those articles were not quite accurate in fact. This article gives you an overview of what the City of Denton, TWU and UNT have planned and how it will affect you.

        Background

        The City of Denton, Texas Woman's University and the University of North Texas have joined together in a project to create a civic information system. While the idea of such a project had been thought about in each organization, it wasn't until a concerned citizen, Mike Cochran, stepped forward and offered to be a catalyst for such a project that all of the parties came together. The purpose of such a project is to meld the unique talents and capabilities of each organization and produce an electronic delivery system for civic and community information. This system will provide timely information in a fashion that citizens will be able to access at their homes, businesses and community centers around Denton. So what is this project?

        The project was initially conceived as a Gopher server utilizing existing UNT/TWU equipment. The City felt that providing information to citizens via dial-up lines to a Gopher server would be a quick and cost efficient method of disseminating information. It will serve as the initial foundation for what we envision as the wired community. Academic Computing Services at UNT agreed to support the City of Denton by making City information available electronically on our existing Gopher server. TWU agreed that it would provide pointers to the City of Denton site from their Gopher. The City, of course, will provide the information.

        Current Status

        Currently, the City of Denton and UNT provide a basic Gopher accessible information system with City agencies' meeting notes and agendas. This system is designed to be expandable with additional information being added on a daily basis.

        Access to electronic community information is provided two ways. The first is via a dial-up modem. Currently there is one single public dial-in line for accessing Denton information electronically. As demand increases, the City plans to add additional lines. Citizens and students do not need an account or any sort of password to access City information through this dial-in line. However, they do need a personal computer, modem and a communications program (Procomm, Kermit, etc.). The City of Denton's electronic information can also be accessed through the Internet. People already having Internet access or accounts on machines connected to the Internet, or who are at the UNT/TWU campus can access the system through any Gopher client for basically any machine (Macintosh, MS-DOS, MS-Windows, UNIX, and VAX).

        Type of Information Provided

        What type of information will be provided in such a system? Any items that are public record and of public interest are candidates. For example:

        • City Council meeting notes and agendas
        • Planning Council meeting notes and agendas
        • Public utility billing rates and information
        • Phone book information for City departments
        • Zoning rules and regulations
        • Community organization information and schedules
        • Tax and land use information
        • Feedback/Suggestion box capabilities for Citizens

        And, as capabilities grow, additional multimedia items can be provided such as:

        • Still pictures and graphics of Denton buildings sights
        • Interactive maps with zooming and hot-spot capability
        • Movie snippets and sound clips of Denton events
        • Movie tours and sample images from museums and University exhibits

        While this list is not exhaustive, it illustrates the potential of an electronic village.

        The Future

        To expand the scope and capabilities of our electronic community information initiatives, the City of Denton, UNT, and TWU recently put in a proposal for a grant from the Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program. This grant will provide for additional funds for expanding this project. Included in this proposal are funds for expansion of community dial-in access, increasing the capacity of our Internet connections, additional equipment, and training.

        Regardless of whether we are successful in obtaining this grant, the City, TWU, and UNT are all committed to working together to make Denton a model community for the new electronic information age. As new developments happen, expect additional articles to appear here in Benchmarks. If you have suggestions or questions, please contact me.



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