Santa Monica Wins First Place for Two Tech Initiatives

City of Santa Monica NEWS

The City of Santa Monica garnered two first-place Technology Solutions Awards from the Public Technology Institute (PTI).  The awards recognize governments at the forefront in deploying technology at the local level. This is the thirteenth consecutive year that Santa Monica has been recognized with these prestigious awards.

Be Excited Be Prepared: Keeping Citizens Informed About Major Public Works Projects
Winner, Public Safety Technology Category

Be Excited! Be Prepared is a comprehensive effort created to inform and engage the community about the progress and impact of construction projects within Santa Monica.  The program takes a unique “high tech, high touch” approach to community engagement, integrating person-to-person community outreach with an interactive web portal and social media channels to effectively reach as many members of the community as possible.  The program’s website, SMConstructs.org, stands out from the competition because of its effective presentation of information on major public works projects and their impacts on the community.

Mobile Parking Website
Winner, Geospatial Information Systems (GIS) Category

To make finding parking easier, the City of Santa Monica launched a mobile-friendly, real-time parking map at smgov.net/parkingmaps to present real-time space availability in nearby parking lots. Leveraging GPS location-aware technology, the parking map zeroes in on a user’s location and provides data on parking availability for lots most convenient to the user’s location. The parking map, which is available in web and mobile formats, also shows users the hours of operation, rates and other information for the city’s beach and downtown parking lots.  Real time availability information is currently available for 16 of the city’s 33 downtown and beach parking lots.  In the coming year, the city will add more parking lots to the program as well as partner with vendors to include real-time parking availability for private lots. 

PTI is a national, non-profit research organization focused on technology and policy trends impacting local governments.  In 2011, it recognized Santa Monica with the Citizen-Engaged Communities Designation for excellence in the use of social media, citizen relationship/records management systems, web portal technology, telephony systems, and mobile communications infrastructure.

Awards will be presented at the 2012 CIO & Leadership Summit, May 17-18 in Boston, MA.  More information on PTI can be found at www.pti.org.