VideoAl Gore's personal involvement aside, there's no doubt that the federal government can take credit for creating the Internet. But while E- commerce is now routinely discussed in such terms as "B2B" and "B2C," the letter "G" has been conspicuously absent.
No longer. Government entities from Capitol Hill to the county clerk want to make life easier for businesses--and citizens--by Web- enabling a vast range of services. The U.S. Postal Service, for example, is scheduled to launch its Mailing Online service this fall to allow small businesses to transmit correspondence electronically to the USPS. And both the Army and the Navy are spending millions of dollars (in the Army's case, hundreds of millions) on Internet-based education so that sailors and soldiers can learn everything from computer programming to English Lit.
Driving this E-government frenzy, for the most part, is citizen demand. "If people can buy books on Amazon.com and get them delivered with very high reliability and at minimum cost, then that becomes their expectation of the norm," says Paul Turner, chief technology officer for American Management Systems Inc., in Fairfax, Virginia, a provider of E-government services. But equally important is the business community's need to cut through governmental red tape that can entangle everything from permit applications to sales-tax collections. In addition, many businesses see vast potential in helping the federal government move some of its $260 billion in annual purchases to the Web.
But most companies are less interested in selling to Uncle Sam than in getting him to move more nimbly. "No more driving to the government office, no more waiting in line, no more wondering if an important application ever got there," says Forrest Claypool, senior vice president for business development for Chicago-based Netgov.com, one of a vast array of Internet providers that are aiding in the proliferation of E-government services. "No wonder Web-based government services are seeing exponential growth."
Some question whether government entities have the technological or business savvy to move quickly into the Internet Age. Staff limitations and imprudent contracts are cited as major stumbling blocks, and Andrea Di Maio, an analyst at research firm Gartner Group Inc., believes "more than 50 percent of E- government projects will fail to deliver the level of service that citizens and businesses require through 2004." But a rocky road is better than none, others argue, and government at all levels seems committed to the effort.
All The Right Reasons
In some cases, a strong commitment is needed simply to keep pace with what's happening elsewhere. The federal government is slated to spend billions of dollars on its E- commerce systems over the next five years, according to Gartner. Still, the United States trails other countries in catching the E-government wave, according to French Caldwell, research director at Gartner. "I'd say E-government efforts, especially on the federal level, are pretty poor," he says. To support that assessment, he cites the United Kingdom's goal of having all of its services online by 2005 and Canada's goal of having 50 percent of its services wired by 2002 and 100 percent by 2004.
Part of the problem lies in connecting the Internet to older computer systems. "The first actual capability tends to be information flow," says Ira Goldstein, worldwide industry director for government services in the Washington, D.C., office of Arthur Andersen, "because it's easily implemented and doesn't require the same integration to government financial systems." As with industry, he adds, governments usually have legacy financial systems that have been around a long time. "Integrating an outside payment capability is much more difficult than providing information on which parks have open ball fields on Thursday," he says.
But the economic impetus to change is compelling. Kaleil Isaza Tuzman, chairman and CEO of govWorks.com, a Web-based E- government firm based in New York, contends it can cost as much as $20 for a public official to process a simple parking ticket offline through lockbox services and other semiautomated procedures. Online, the cost drops to $1 to $1.50. E-procurement promises similar savings. According to NIC Commerce, in Reston, Virginia, a provider of E-government services, electronic procurement can reduce government procurement transaction costs from more than $100 per action to less than $20.
Governments are being driven into the Internet Age not only by citizens and businesses that want faster, more efficient access to government services, but also by a spate of dot-coms that often provide much of the technological infrastructure governments need to become Web- enabled. Such companies as Netgov.com, NIC Commerce, PayTheTicket.com, Ezgov .com, govWorks.com, and the ingeniously named E-The-People are among those rushing into this market.
Netgov offers an array of services to municipalities, from customized E-mail tailored to the interests of individuals to a searchable resource center and a civic-events calendar. NIC Commerce has supplied E-procurement services to NASA, the Department of Defense, and local entities as well; it recently cut deals with Bank of America and Citibank to allow government credit- card holders to buy goods and services online. Several other sites act as portals, giving businesses and citizens the ability to do everything from pay taxes to sign petitions.
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