BasicGov / BLOG

Vancouver and Whistler are transforming into an Olympic host and the impact of this event are emerging everywhere.

Each day there are new signs, mass transit schedule changes, road closures, route changes, new pavilions and new structures. Our building receives at least 2 or 3 notifications per week of such changes in our immediate area as we are only 2 blocks away from the main media center at the new Vancouver Convention Center. Soon there will be 5000 athletes and hundreds of thousands of new people cramming into the streets, and undoubtedly there will be protests. It is definitely a challenge and not everything will go according to plan.

On the other hand, there are many positive benefits of this event to our city. Our downtown entertainment center has been completely revitalized and there is an influx of art, sculptures and music. There are new entertainment venues where 1000′s of people will be able to watch events live on huge outdoor screens and in theatres. Next to the waters in False Creek, near the Olympic Oval in Richmond, up in Whistler, and in many other areas there will be free live music all day and night from musicians of all types, from all over, for all the people.

For BasicGov employees, we sit here and think about what happened behind the scenes. All of the above required the involvement of political will and city staff to make it happen. Imagine how many building permit and license applications plus scheduled building inspections the City had this year. Sure the Vancouver Olympic Committee was responsible for a majority of the planning, but in the end it was someone in the city that had to assess the impacts of a road closure, put up the new signs, and approve new venues, new bars, and allow the Olympic rings to sit on a barge in the water.

All we are doing now is hoping for colder weather and bit of snow.

Mike

As of last week, the new BasicGov Citizen Portal is now available.  The Product Development team at BasicGov been hard at work on the portal over the summer, and we are looking forward to implementing it, and seeing how it is used in action.  Our Implementation team is hard at work preparing for upcoming implementation as well, to make sure that this transition is as fast and easy as possible for our customers.

The Portal allows citizens to apply for permits, register complaints, submit planning applications, apply for licenses, request inspections, and download documents, online over the web.  The Portal directly interacts with the BasicGov system, so that as soon as citizens or developers apply for permits (or complaints, planning applications, or licenses) on the Portal, this information is immediately reflected in BasicGov, so that the city users can immediately see the permit, schedule inspections, and update the citizen on the status of the permit.  The Portal is a fast and easy way for citizens to get information to the city, and it is a great way for the city to immediately let citizens and developers know when the permit information has been updated.

The Portal is configurable for each city as well.  Each city can work with BasicGov to configure the information that is displayed for permits, complaints, licenses, and planning applications.  This means that the fields on each screen are configurable, as are the header information, and the messages that appear on each screen.  The technical architecture for the Portal enables BasicGov to configure this information quickly and easily for each city.

Request a demo.