See Open (local) Government at its new home on bradley-holt.com.
Last night I went to the Burlington, Vermont City Council meeting to listen to our newly re-elected mayor, Bob Kiss, give his State of the City speech and watch the City Council attempt to elect a new council president. I said "attempt" because, after 14 rounds of voting, they were still deadlocked 7-7 for opposing candidates. However, that's not what I want to talk about. In Mayor Bob Kiss' speech he made the following statement:
My administration worked closely with the Open Government Committee formed by resolution of the City Council. In response to committee recommendations, we’ve included more information about public meetings on the City web-site and the Planning Department added a new section about proposed and pending zoning amendments. During the campaign it was clear that people want to know more about the activities of each city department. Over the next year we’ll look closely at how to finance and build a more uniform, responsive and user-friendly City website that will keep you better informed about public meetings and how you can participate in the process of government.
I'm all for open government and the City of Burlington, Vermont could certainly use a better website. I'd like to give the city some advice on its priorities in building a better website. This blog post is my first round of advice, but I'd like to hear reactions from other web people in and around Burlington — or anyone else who has an interest in our city having a better website! This advice is based on the goals outlined by Mayor Bob Kiss: that the website is inline with the spirit of Open Government, is responsive, and is user-friendly.
First, the website must be accessible and use open standards. I put these two together because by using open standards the website can be accessible. Specifically, the website should use strictly semantic XHTML. This allows for its use in the widest range of user agents (browsers) by the widest range of user abilities (as opposed to disabilities). Its presentation should be progressively enriched through CSS and its behavior should be progressively enhanced through unobtrusive JavaScript. Progressive enhancement means that the website is useful, at its core, without any CSS or JavaScript. It becomes more useful through the use of CSS and then, perhaps, even more useful through the use of JavaScript. However, neither CSS nor JavaScript should be required to access the website's content.
Second, the website should be built using free (as in freedom, not cost) and open source software. It is our government's responsibility to use non-proprietary software wherever possible. When it comes to building websites and web applications, there are no excuses for not using free and open source software. The capabilities of the open web platforms available equal, or exceed, the capabilities of proprietary web platforms. Any custom software developed for the city's website must be licensed to the city under a free and open source license (this does not mean that the city shouldn't pay for this software to be developed).
Third, the city should embrace the concept of open linked data. This means that the city should publish data, not just content. This data should be both human and machine readable. This allows third parties to access raw data and repurpose this data in new and interesting ways. To this end, data and content should be either put in the public domain (which is probably the case already) or use a Creative Commons license. Where possible, the city's website should consume open data published by others rather than duplicating effort. There are several technical approaches to publishing and consuming open linked data including Microformats and the Semantic Web.
I hope these recommendations are useful. Once I've heard some feedback from other web people, I'll forward these recommendations to my city councilors and the mayor. Hopefully they'll find it helpful in improving the city's website!
