Naperville, Elgin top suburbs for online information

Suburban communities are responding to public demand for more information accessible online, with Naperville leading the way among Illinois’ 20 largest cities, according to a newly published study by the University of Illinois at Chicago.

And many larger suburbs are striving hard to be timely and interactive with their information by plunging into the world of social media, the study entitled “Civic Engagement and Local E-Government: Social Networking Comes of Age” found.

Co-authored by Karen Mossberger and Yonghong Wu, professors in the university’s Department of Public Administration, the study ranks 75 U.S. and 20 Illinois cities by 90 to 94 variables, including the online presence of contact information, municipal budgets, downloadable forms, search engines, meeting agendas, regular updates and many more.

Northwest and West suburbs among Illinois’ top 10 were Naperville at number 1, Elgin at 3, Aurora at 5, Schaumburg 6th and Arlington Heights at 9.

Naperville Community Relations Manager Nadja Lalvani attributes the city’s high ranking to at least a couple of factors.

Firstly, Naperville has always made interaction with its citizens a high priority, even before the advent of the Internet, she said.

The Web and social media only further enable that philosophy.

Secondly, Naperville residents are especially tech-savvy. That’s one reason why the city landed an Apple store downtown in the middle of a recession, Lalvani said.

The city and business community have continued to innovate to serve its sophisticated clientele, creating an interactive map for snow removal and brush pickup as well as an app for downtown Naperville, she said.

“We’re always looking at new and different technology and trying to keep up,” Lalvani added.

While other Illinois communities might look to Naperville for ideas, the city has been finding guidance in best industry practices — usually in business. Government is often slower to adapt to new technology, Lalvani said.

“We were actually very surprised, very pleased, but it’s not why we do it,” she said of the study’s findings.

Elgin City Manager Sean Stegall said Web interactivity has allowed citizens to become more involved with their local government, a change which has been beneficial for all.

He points to the blizzard of 2011 as a pivotal moment in the evolution of Elgin’s use of interactive technology.

Not only was the city able to keep residents and businesses continuously up to speed on the progress of snow removal, but citizens provided useful input about areas that needed more help.

While the city knows how hard it’s working to improve its online accessibility, the study’s findings were a useful validation.

“It’s always great to get objective feedback,” Stegall said, adding that the city aims to be ranked first one day.

Aurora Public Information Coordinator Kevin Stahr noted that the study was conducted during the spring of last year, even before the city launched a Facebook page and Twitter account. \If the same study were being done now, he believes Aurora would rank even higher.

While municipalities are still juggling traditional responsibilities of fire and police protection and road maintenance, Stahr said the motivation to be accessible online is just as much at the heart of good governing.

“Municipalities and government are not aimed at making more money but at improving the quality of life and providing services, and this is how we make people aware of that,” Stahr said. “We’ve been making a concerted effort to drive traffic to our website.”

The second most populous city in Illinois, Aurora attracted more than 500,000 unique visitors to its website in 2011, Stahr said.

Schaumburg Village Manager Ken Fritz said using technology to provide residents with everything from public documents to breaking news on road closures and traffic signal outages has been a priority.

“We focus on it. We make it a point,” Fritz said. “It comes from the expectation of the residents and businesses and what they see in the marketplace.”

Fritz said he foresees Schaumburg’s website continuing to improve, especially in its user-friendliness and navigability.

“It’s a work in progress,” he said. “I think we can do things better. You can find everything, but it’s not as streamlined as I would like.”

Mossberger, who co-authored the report, said the study looks more at the opportunities cities are providing than the degree to which citizens are partaking of them.

One thing still relatively rare on government websites and Facebook and Twitter accounts are the kinds of rigorous discussions of issues more commonly found on newspaper websites or other kinds of forums.

“One doesn’t replace the other, but there’s something about asking a government official directly,” Mossberger said.

The reason discussion forums may be slower in reaching public sector websites is that legal questions governing the civility of discussion there haven’t been entirely worked out yet, Mossberger said.

The study focused on municipalities as they typically are the unit of government closest to people and most involved in their lives. And it’s a unit of government that seems eager to use technology to better fulfill its outreach responsibilities, Mossberger said.

“They seem to really want to do better and to know how they can improve,” she added.