REVISED
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON November 19, 2012 If you’re looking for any of the city council members this morning or the city manager either for that matter – stop looking. They are all at a closed meeting of city council to talk about what they refer to as a Human Resources matter – which means the hiring, or the firing of someone, or dealing with a very serious complaint.
We goofed.
A guy at city hall who is a lot smarter than I am called to point out that I had things mixed up. There are TWO closed meetings – one this morning, the 19th, which was a CLOSED Workshop at which Linda Moore took Council and senior staff through an exercise intended to “improve teamwork, raise the bar and expand on the expectations”. They did that I was informed under Section 239 (3.1) of the Municipal Act. That event took place at the McMaster University DeGroote School of Business.
The other meeting, the one that has to do with the hiring and the firing – that one takes place NEXT Monday.
Finding out where the meeting were taking place was clearly a challenge I didn’t meet. The city’s web site shows two locations – one document says it is to take place at the McMaster University, DeGroote School of Business while another document says it will take place in the `Cabinet Room at a local hotel. I clearly got it all mixed up.
Doesn’t matter which, you’re not allowed in anyway – but it does point to a problem with the way information shows up on the web site, which is to undergo a significant and badly needed upgrade. I am on the city web site close to a dozen times in any one day and know it as well as most. It isn’t all that friendly. There is a Request for Proposals put out by the city for someone to do the upgrade that closes early in December.
Doctors viewing data on a web site – done right the internet allows for a very smooth and fulsome display of data and information. Burlington isn’t there yet – but they are at least moving in the right direction.
Whoever is chosen will take on the task of re-building the web site. This is an opportunity for the city to “shine” by choosing the right firm and not getting stuck with a lowest bidder situation. Please – not another pier. Hopefully, when the job is done, we will see a source of information that is user friendly and holds everything you ever wanted to know about the city. Showing two locations for a meeting you are not allowed to attend isn’t quite what is meant by useful information.
Friends sent us a link to a piece that gives a glimpse of where the future could take us. Have a look. Burlington could have something like this; the city could provide transit information on the web that would be real time to let me know where the bus is and how long before it gets to my stop. There is no reason why you shouldn’t be able to make an appointment with your council member via the web site.
The city has decided it wants to move all its information out to a web site and let the public interact with the city at that level rather than deal with people face to face or over the telephone.
Properly designed getting what you want via a web site can work very well. Unfortunately much of what Burlington has in place right now – just doesn`t work all that well.
What kind of experiences have you had? Leave a comment.
