Public Libraries and Local E-Government

Introduction

While public libraries in the United States have long been trusted institutions within their communities, as a result of recent advances in technology and changes in society, public libraries now play a unique and critical social role by ensuring free public Internet access to community members. Nearly every public library in the United States now offers free Internet access—98.9% of public library branches are connected to the Internet and 98.4% of connected public library branches offer public Internet access (Bertot, McClure, Jaeger, & Ryan, 2006). As a result, public libraries fill a community need by ensuring that all citizens have access to and assistance in using e-government. A significant proportion of the United States population—including people who have no other means of access, people who need help using technology, and people who have lower quality access—rely on the access and trust the assistance available in public libraries to use e-government websites (Jaeger & Fleischmann, 2007). With the increasing necessity of the Internet as a means of access to government services and information, the free access provided by public libraries is an invaluable resource to local communities, residents, and local governments.

Residents are not the only ones who have come to rely on access to e-government in public libraries. Federal, state, and local government agencies now also rely on public libraries to provide citizens with access to and guidance in using e-government websites, forms, and services; many government agencies simply direct citizens to the nearest public library for help (Bertot, Jaeger, Langa, & McClure, 2006a, 2006b). Many local government agencies now direct citizens to the nearest public library for access and help in applying for permits, scheduling appointments, paying fees and taxes, and completing numerous other local government functions online. This confluence of events has created a major new social role for public libraries—guarantors of e-government access.

This chapter explores the relationships between local e-government and public libraries, a relationship made more interesting by the fact that public libraries are also local government entities. Drawing upon several different streams of data about public libraries and e-government, this chapter will explore the issues related to public libraries’ position as local government agency and local e-government access point. This chapter will explore:

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  The reasons that public libraries became local access points for e-government

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  The impacts of local political environments on the delivery of e-government in public libraries

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  The effect of trust placed in public libraries on local e-government usage

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  The ways in which public libraries impact the delivery of local e-government services

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  The influence of the public library on citizen interaction with e-government

While public libraries in the United States have been extremely successful in linking citizens and e-government, it essential to better understand the roles of public libraries in access to and education about local e-government in order to improve the delivery of e-government and to identify lessons from these efforts that can be translated to other nations.