Digital Government and Geographic Information Systems

Abstract

The focus of this chapter is to examine how government agencies are deploying geographic information systems (GIS) to enhance the delivery of digital government. We will explain how critical technological advances are enabling government agencies to use GIS in web-based applications In addition, we will illustrate the approaches that state and local governments in the United States are taking to deploy GIS for e-government applications using examples from Indianapolis, Indiana, Tucson, Arizona, Washington D.C. and the State of Oregon’s Department of Environmental Protection. While these examples greatly improve service delivery performance and enhance public decision-making, we raise the issue that e-government GIS applications may be more broadly deployed in organizations that are better adept at dealing with the managerial and technical issues related to using GIS.