By Graeme Philipson

Only one quarter of Australia’s Local Government Authorities have published a digital strategy. Another half intend to do so, but have not done it yet.

Nearly three quarters have a Facebook page, and 20 percent have developed a council mobile phone app. More than half are moving, or have moved, to the cloud computing model. But very few have developed metrics to tell them how well their digital strategy is working.

These are some of the preliminary survey findings of the Local Government Digital Maturity Index, an Government News assessment and benchmarking tool that enables Australia’s LGAs to determine their level of digital readiness across service delivery, planning and development, and internal systems.

Councils are encouraged to participate, by completing this 20-minute survey. Each participant will then receive, at no cost, a tailored benchmarking report comparing their responses, and their overall Digital Index, to other councils.

Not only does the index apply metrics across a range of local government activities and services to show how well the council is doing in these areas, but also highlights where there is room for improvement.

At a time when online delivery of services and resident access to community data are key issues, the extent to which LGAs are delivering in these key areas is critical.

Take the survey here. 

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