"Why don't governments just hurry up and automate these
processes?"
It's a constant refrain, heard at service counters in government
offices across the country, usually from frustrated folks who have
spent their day crisscrossing town and filling out forms for
something as simple as vehicle registration.
When it comes to improving service delivery, many government
organizations are at a disadvantage. Conventional pen and paper
processes may be unsophisticated, but they're entrenched within
government cultures because they have worked reasonably well for
decades. In addition, a sweeping transition to e-service systems
appears on the surface to open a Pandora's box of data security,
privacy and cost issues. It's enough to make even the most seasoned
IT professional break out in a cold sweat.
Fortunately, this was not the case for Service New Brunswick
(SNB).
Service New Brunswick was created in 1995 after a series of
province-wide public consultations revealed a common desire for
consolidated or "single window" government service delivery.
E-government wasn't a new idea in New Brunswick, but the SNB team
knew that elaborate amalgamation projects rarely live up to their
original objectives. Across the country and around the world, many
of today's government IT infrastructures consist of an intricate
mix of incompatible systems that can be hamstrung by the slightest
technical oversight. SNB's system was no exception to this and,
although the public had spoken and was looking for improvements,
the task would be easier said than done.
With government credibility on the line and the public openly
calling for a new system, Service New Brunswick chose a calculated,
evolutionary path with three goals in mind: consolidation, data
protection and cost minimization.
Streamlining a fragmented system
New Brunswick is comprised of a mix of almost 40 communities,
primarily rural. Before the launch of SNB, this represented dozens
of government offices scattered throughout the province, each with
its own IT system. For many constituents, interacting with
government required a significant time and travel investment for
something as routine as a motor vehicle renewal. The solution lay
in web-enabling government systems so that citizens could access
services from any Internet connection. SNB faced these issues head
on by investing in a new server system and, recently, by adding an
enterprise level storage system to create a central online database
of service information. By linking rural offices via www.snb.ca b a secure, one-stop-shop
for services to people regardless of their location b the public
has quick, online access to information. Gone are the days of
driving around town or standing in multiple line-ups to fill out
simple applications.
SNB's main principle is to offer a simple and always available
means for the public to interact with government. SNB chose to
create an online system that would complement, rather than replace,
existing over-the-counter and call centre services. Moreover, it
chose to enhance the system by establishing a third and final tier
of data access for staff and the public. SNB's "always on" storage
infrastructure, built on a Sun Microsystems network of servers,
storage and software, acts as a secure, electronic filing cabinet.
It ensures that personal information such as addresses, Social
Insurance Numbers, and customer information is housed
electronically in a safe location and is always within arm's reach
of authorized government staff whether they are in Dalhousie or
five hours away in Saint John. With the information in digital
form, any member of the public who requires assistance can walk
into any office or call SNB TeleServices and get the same level of
quick, streamlined service.
Establishing a common storage site for data in this way also
created an opportunity to save money by "trimming the fat" from the
system. With government offices acting as satellites connected to a
main database, dozens of costly servers with underused storage
devices performing duplicate tasks could now be consolidated. What
was previously a group of 35 high performance servers, each hooked
into its own storage device and a tape back-up system, now connects
to a single, enterprise level storage area network (SAN). By
reducing the overall volume of IT storage systems and drastically
reducing often overlooked operating costs such as utilities,
storage tape, and person hours, SNB's system maintenance costs have
dropped to 38 per cent of what they were two years ago.
Heightened privacy and data protection
While connecting government through the SNB system created a
more convenient network for information sharing, it also produced
some challenging security issues. In 2005, SNB handled more than
five million transactions for New Brunswickers, ranging from
driver's license renewals to applications for hunting licences to
new business registrations; 35 per cent of them were processed
online. Consequently, in addition to being the conduit to
government for 750,000 people, SNB is also the custodian of massive
amounts of sensitive public and personal data. Better management of
the growing repository of data would be driven by stringent privacy
policies and SNB's powerful storage technology.
The introduction of privacy legislation such as PIPEDA, and New
Brunswick's own POPIA, have resulted in an exponential increase in
the amount of data an organization like SNB needs to keep under
electronic lock and key. SNB developed several internal data
protection policies that classify information according to its
level of sensitivity. Anything deemed sensitive is reviewed by
records management staff and filed accordingly. Information that
must remain private is secured on the storage device, while
publicly available data occupies a more accessible location on the
system.
SNB expects to have almost nine terabytes (9,000 gigabytes) of
data stored on its systems by this summer and the demand will
continue to grow as new services are rolled out. Ensuring that this
growing body of information remains accessible will continue to
present challenges, and so SNB opted to work with Sun Microsystems
to ensure that the province continues to make good on its
commitments. Combined with SNB's own data backup and retention
policies, the Sun solution, comprised of servers running on the
Solaris operating system and storage arrays, offers optimal
utilization of storage resources and extremely fast access to
information. Staff have real-time access to electronic documents or
reports resulting in faster processing and positively impacting the
pace of public service delivery. Based on SNB's needs and Sun's
technology roadmap, SNB hopes it will always have the
high-performance storage capacity it needs, making it easier to
evolve over time.
Finally, keeping this all under wraps is a sophisticated
software control. With electronic versions of public records housed
securely on SNB's storage system, it is easy to restrict access to
only authorized personnel through varying levels of secure user
sign-on privileges. These added levels of security provide the
public with assurances that their private information will remain
private. 062782
Dorothea Foley is Director of Information Technology for Service
New Brunswick.
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