For interest.
Best Wishes
Phil
-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Jellinek [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 20 September 2002 13:55
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: E-Government Bulletin: 09 September 2002
* E-GOVERNMENT BULLETIN.
The Email Newsletter On Electronic Government,
UK And Worldwide.
* ISSUE 122, FRIDAY 20 SEPTEMBER 2002.
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* NOTE: As a navigation aid to visually impaired people and others using
screen readers, all headings begin with an asterisk and end with a full
stop.
* CONTENTS.
Section one: News.
High-tech infrastructure for deprived estate
- Newham project to launch in November.
Audit system 'sends out wrong message'
- 'uncertain' ratings could hit staff motivation.
New group scrutinises open source software
- senior civil servants swap intelligence.
A vote for Scottish youth
- elections for online 'parliament.'
Bush drafts cybersecurity policy
- public agencies to be held accountable.
News in brief: Email crackdown continues in Liverpool; Flexible working
debate; Everybody online; Parents explore technology.
Section two: debate report - VoxPolitics.
Participation and reality: Dan Jellinek reports from a meeting convened
to examine how technology can be used to help revitalise democracy.
Section three: opinion - e-democracy.
Beyond government: third party web sites have a key role to play in
generating and channeling public debate on policy issues, says David
Brake.
Section four: international - US security.
Brotherliness and bunkers: William Mead discovers that information
sharing is still the key barrier to strengthening US homeland security.
[contents ends.]
* SPONSORED NOTICE: PRACTICAL POINTERS ON
IMPLEMENTING E-GOVERNMENT
From LexisNexis Butterworths Tolley, publishers of Standardisation of
PFI Contracts for the OGC, comes a new title on Local Government
Contracts and Procurement with a specific chapter on e-government.
Written by Rosemary Mulley of Nabarro Nathanson, together with leading
local authorities, the e-government section provides practical advice on
legal and commercial considerations, CRM databases, risk management and
procurement guidelines.
To purchase your copy of the book/online resource, with case studies,
sample contracts and model clauses, call the government sales team on
020 7347 3538. Alternatively order online at
http://www.localgovernmentdirect.co.uk
You may also set up no-obligation trials to other PFI titles on our list
here.
[Sponsored notice ends.]
* SECTION ONE: NEWS.
* HIGH-TECH INFRASTRUCTURE FOR DEPRIVED ESTATE.
An initiative to create the UK's most advanced residential interactive
television infrastructure and services is set to launch at a deprived
Newham housing estate in November after months of delay, Newham council
confirmed this week.
The Carpenters Estate consists of 750 homes, over half of which are in
tower blocks. The estate is in Stratford Ward, which is among the most
deprived wards in the UK. It is estimated that almost 80 per cent of the
estate's residents are from ethnic minorities.
When the 'Carpenters Connect' project launches, selected residents on
the estate will receive state-of-the-art set top boxes fed by a high
bandwidth connection (see http://www.newham.org.uk/wired). Residents
have already had the chance to become involved in a community television
programme-making project run by the Media Trust
(http://www.mediatrust.org). Other features will include everything from
interactive public services to online gaming.
Partners in the multimillion pound project include infrastructure
providers NeosNetworks and MASE, set top box manufacturer PACE, and
Microsoft. Early problems encountered included trouble with rats chewing
through wiring, after unusually large numbers came into the estate after
being disturbed by the nearby construction of the Stratford high-speed
European rail link.
Funding for the scheme was won from the Department for Education and
Skills' 10 million pound 'Wired up Communities' scheme. The scheme is
also set to fund six other, mainly web-based, community networking
projects, in the Kensington area of Liverpool; Blackburn; East
Manchester; Alston Moor and Brampton in Cumbria; and Framlingham in
Suffolk. For details see: http://www.dfes.gov.uk/wired
* AUDIT SYSTEM 'SENDS OUT WRONG MESSAGE'.
The Audit Commission's system for rating local authorities' e-government
work could be making it more difficult for councils to engage staff and
citizens in new projects, according to the latest council to be audited.
Tewkesbury Borough Council (http://www.tewkesburybc.gov.uk) is among
around 15 per cent of local authorities whose e-government plans have so
far been rated as showing 'poor' or 'uncertain' prospects for
improvement (http://fastlink.headstar.com/tewk). According to the
council, the ratings system itself could have a negative effect on
performance. "'Uncertain' gives the wrong message - we'll certainly
improve," said Tewkesbury's director of resources Peter Antill. "But
this could make it difficult to motivate staff and sell e- government to
the public."
Furthermore, the whole way e-government projects are viewed is skewed
towards urban areas, according to Phil Claridge of Tewkesbury's
e-government team. "The feeling people have is that there is a 'one size
fits all approach' to e-government, based on what urban areas do. For
example, you hear a lot about kiosks. Kiosks are a good thing for urban
areas but would be a waste of time in Tewkesbury, which has a dispersed
population," Claridge said.
Ironically, the Audit Commission scrapped the old ratings last year in
an effort to avoid stigmatising councils that perform less well. The
commission says the new ratings, which reflect how well local
authorities implement Best Value principles, are supposed to have a more
positive impact. "We don't want to create a self-fulfilling perception
with these lower ratings," said a commission spokesperson.
Previously, future prospects for improvement were rated as 'no',
'unlikely', 'probably', and 'yes'. The new categories are 'poor',
'uncertain', 'promising', and 'excellent'. Around 50 local authorities
have been assessed under the new scheme.
* NEW GROUP SCRUTINISES OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE.
A new government special interest group on open source software was
convened last week, bringing together senior civil servants and
representatives of local government to share intelligence about
projects, products and suppliers.
The group, which will reconvene four times a year, is chaired by Mick
Morgan, internet services technical manager at the Office of Government
Commerce (OGC - http://www.ogc.gov.uk). According to Morgan, government
departments share some core concerns about open source, and are hungry
for information. "They are particularly concerned about how open source
will be supported, but they also need more information about suppliers
and the costs of open source," he said.
In particular, departments want to know how to offset the costs of
transition from proprietary to open source software against the savings
that will come from sharing knowledge and applications across
departments, Morgan said. These calculations are complicated because
many departments source their software through service contracts with
third party suppliers.
Although at present information is flowing mainly in one direction –
from the OGC outwards - Morgan hopes the group will establish more of a
dialogue between departments and OGC and among departments. Although the
project is led by OGC and the Office of the e-Envoy
(http://www.e-envoy.gov.uk), local government is represented by SOCITM
(http://www.socitm.gov.uk) and IDeA (http://www.idea.gov.uk).
* A VOTE FOR SCOTTISH YOUTH.
In early October, 15,000 young people from the Scottish Highlands will
cast electronic votes for candidates for Highland Youth Voice, an online
parliament with 75 seats that debates health, crime, education and
transport issues and has regular consultations with the Scottish
Parliament.
Candidates were nominated earlier this week by 29 secondary schools in
the Highlands, following initial election processes at each school.
Highland Youth Voice (http://www.highlandyouthvoice.org) recently held a
debate on how to increase youth involvement in sports activities and
will next tackle crime and transport issues.
The organisation, which is sponsored by government and health service
agencies and supported by the International Teledemocracy Centre at
Glasgow's Napier University (http://itc.napier.ac.uk), has previously
addressed Scottish national conferences on health and culture issues and
met with members of the Scottish Executive.
* BUSH DRAFTS CYBERSECURITY POLICY.
The US federal government this week unveiled plans to hold public
agencies accountable for network and information security and to look
into increasing the amount of cross-agency purchasing and management. At
the state and local level, the document encourages the introduction of
security programs, awareness audits and standards.
The draft policy
(http://www.whitehouse.gov/pcipb/cyberstrategy-draft.pdf) is intended to
reduce the nation's vulnerability to "deliberate, malicious disruption"
caused by internet hackers and viruses. The policy document draws a
clear link between tackling these threats and those posed by terrorism.
The draft was drawn up following town hall consultation with citizens,
academics and representatives of public and private sector
organisations. Another eight town hall meetings are scheduled to take
place around the country and comments on the document can also be sent
by email to [log in to unmask]
NOTE: See also 'Brotherliness and bunkers', section four, this issue.
* NEWS IN BRIEF:
* CRACKDOWN CONTINUES: Liverpool City Council is to continue
'indefinitely' its experiment to restrict the use of internal email by
its staff on a Wednesday, as a means of focusing attention on how email
should and should not be used. The move was controversial when it was
introduced in July (see E- Government Bulletin, 22 July 2002) but
Liverpool executive director Phil Halsall told E-Government Bulletin
this week that initial trials had proved successful.
* FLEXIBLE WORKING: E-Government Bulletin publisher Headstar, in
association with the Public Policy Forum think-tank, is running an
online debate on teleworking and flexible working in the public sector
from 30 September to 4 October, aimed at producing a 'top ten' list of
tips for successful teleworking. It's free to take part. If you are
interested, please send your name, job title and email address to:
[log in to unmask]
* EVERYBODY ONLINE: Two hundred residents in Brannel, Cornwall accessed
the internet, used webcams and took digital photographs from their local
community centre last week as part of 'Everybody Online', a national
project to increase access to technology in disadvantaged communities.
The project is run by Citizens Online: http://www.citizensonline.org.uk
* PRACTICAL PARENTING: An initiative to help parents feel more involved
with their children's education and keep them up to date with new
technologies is being launched in London next week. The 'parents online'
week, run by the Department of Education and Skills, will allow parents
and their children access to computers in schools, libraries and UK
Online Centres across the country from 30 September to 4
October:
http://www.parentsonline.gov.uk
[Section one ends.]
* SPONSORED NOTICE: IDEA E-CHAMPIONS NETWORK
FIRST CONFERENCE – INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
- Thursday 26 September, QEII Conference Centre, London
There's still time to book your place at the IDeA's first-ever annual
conference and exhibition for its e- champions network. This one-day
event will examine, from international perspectives, how e-government
transforms public services, organisations, employment and social
inclusion. Delegates will have the chance to hear e-government experts
from the USA, Italy, Portugal, Republic of Ireland, the States of Jersey
and the UK.
Every authority in the e-champions network is eligible for two free
places. Additional places are available for 90 pounds + VAT per
delegate.
To book, visit http://www.idea.gov.uk/events/e-champions or email
[log in to unmask] or phone 01323 637701
[Sponsored notice ends.]
* SECTION TWO: DEBATE REPORT
- VOXPOLITICS.
PARTICIPATION AND REALITY.
by Dan Jellinek [log in to unmask]
E-democracy experts, politicians, civil servants and academics were
among the crowd at a packed meeting convened earlier this month by the
online campaigns body VoxPolitics to debate the government's new
consultation paper on e-democracy (see http://www.edemocracy.gov.uk).
The technology writer and commentator Bill Thompson opened the meeting
by saying the government needed to start by looking at how we can
revitalise democracy, and then look at how technology might be able to
help with bits and pieces, rather than starting by assuming technology
would itself be able to revitalise democracy.
Sian Kevill heads the BBC's New Politics Initiative, which has been
tasked with drawing together elements of the BBC's output in innovative
new ways to refresh its political coverage, particularly for a younger
audience.
She told the meeting that the current widespread failure of large parts
of society to engage in or show any interest in the democratic process
was largely due to a feeling of powerlessness on behalf of individuals.
"People ask 'what can I do on my own? Nobody will listen to me.' They
also don't know how to begin to engage with the government or
politicians. And finally, they feel nothing would happen anyway," she
said.
Broadcasters and in particular the BBC could play a key role in
addressing some of these problems, Kevill said. For example, they could
help explain in simple terms what people can do to engage with the
system; and they could tailor more of their output to addressing
people's needs and wishes, as determined by a continual process of
public consultation.
Internet consultant David Brake told the meeting that unofficial outlets
for public debate are just as important as official ones (see also
section three, this issue, where Brake develops this theme). In
particular he said 'weblogs' – the free-form, interactive online diaries
that have become something of a craze in recent years – demonstrated
that the web was becoming the natural home to unlimited freedom of
expression. Brake runs his own acclaimed weblog at http://blog.org
Another debater pointed out that it is not just brand new technologies
that can be used to revitalise democracy, but 'nearly-new' technologies
such as telephone call centres as well. "We need to think not so much in
terms of e-democracy, as multi-channel democracy or modernising
government", said Rhion Jones of Dialogue Data Management.
The issue of webcasting of democratic meetings (see also E-Government
Bulletin, issues 120 and 121) was raised by Mathew Jellings of
UKCouncil. He said webcasting with an interactive element was useful as
it gave people a chance to maintain their anonymity and allow them to
couch questions in their own time, putting less pressure on people than
if they were attending a council meeting in person.
Richard Stubbs of Newham Online said one of the difficulties with any
online policy consultation with government was the fact that
government's view of what had happened when in a policy debate tended to
be spun to fit in with their own political imperatives.
"The government spins, it reinvents the past. What guarantee is there
that when an online policy debate has taken place, history will not be
reinvented by the government, and that the policy process is and will
always be a shared reality?"
This point was answered in part by Professor Stephen Coleman of the
Hansard Society, who pointed out e- democracy was actually not about
government at all, but about Parliament.
Last year Coleman, with fellow academic Jay Blumler, mooted the concept
of an 'online civic commons', a new independent virtual debating and
consultation chamber aimed at boosting public input into democracy (see
`Realising democracy online' at:
http://www.citizensonline.org.uk/publications.shtml).
This radical concept will be among many that civil servants and
ministers will now ponder as the consultation period on the government's
first e-democracy green paper draws to a close at the end of next month.
[Section two ends.]
* SPECIAL NOTICE: E-DEMOCRACY EXCHANGE.
The publishers of E-Government Bulletin are hosting the e-Democracy
Exchange in London on 19 November to discuss the use of technology to
engage the public in the democratic process.
Speakers include Dr Ken Ritchie, chief executive, Electoral Reform
Society; Peter Livesey, assistant director of e-democracy, Office of the
e-Envoy; David McElhinney, executive director, Liverpool City Council;
Alan Winchcombe, electoral services manager, Swindon Borough Council;
James Crabtree, The Work Foundation; and Dan Jellinek, editor of
E-Government Bulletin.
Bulletin readers can register at a 50 per cent discount by writing the
word 'bulletin' after their surnames on the registration form at:
http://www.electronic-government.com/e-democracy.htm
[Special notice ends.]
* SECTION THREE: OPINION
- E-DEMOCRACY.
BEYOND GOVERNMENT.
by David Brake
It is gratifying, with the publication of the new consultation paper on
e-democracy, to see the government expressing an interest in using new
technologies not just for e-voting but as a way of involving the public
more broadly in the democratic system.
If new technologies are to have a positive effect, however, it is not
sufficient merely to provide an email address or website for each
parliamentary sub-committee.
A three stage process is required. First, people need to be guided to
the places where their participation will count. Second, they need to
understand how what they say makes a difference (and how, in some cases,
it may not). And third, to break through the atmosphere of apathy and
cynicism that characterises many people's attitude to the democratic
process, they need to be shown repeatedly how ordinary people working
within the system are able to make a difference.
Imagine for a moment you are an entrepreneurial Scot interested in
encouraging local businesses to recycle more. You might want to contact
your local council, and you could write to your MP but would you have
the time to research the position of the Scottish Assembly? The regional
development board? The European Union? The DTI? How much money do these
bodies have to spend in your area, how difficult will it be to get their
attention and how likely are they in the end to get involved?
Faced with such complexities is it any wonder that people interested in
tackling a problem look instead to single issue organisations like
Greenpeace to represent their interests.
While naturally enough e-democracy campaigners want to proclaim
successes, these are hard to find. Trials of postal ballots have had
much more effect on voter turnouts than experiments with e-voting.
The Number 10 website's take on e-consultation
(http://www.number-10.gov.uk/output/page598.asp) is that if you make an
e- petition and gather 300 signatures, you will get a mention of your
petition on the site and a brief response from the relevant department.
Unfortunately, the website doesn't actually let browsers know what the
original petition was, so you can't even rely on it to give free
publicity to your cause. There have only been six such petitions in the
past 17 months.
At present, potential participants have to figure out the legislative
system for themselves to determine when and where they can be consulted
on the issues they care about. Where feedback is possible, it is not
clear whether anyone with decision-making power is listening, and if
they are how important an individual's view is compared to the views of
corporations or lobby groups.
What should the government do about this? Well, the 'life episodes'
approach of UK Online is certainly the right idea. As well as providing
information structured in the traditional form -"here is where you can
provide feedback to the draft Communications bill CM 5508-I" - the
government could guide the citizen through the process using a simple
expert system - "What aspect of government policy are you interested in?
Local government is responsible for X, your MP is responsible for Y,
Europe has this policy - and you can reach them all this way."
While it is laudable that the government is considering running its own
online message boards across a broad range of sites to facilitate
consultation, I fear this would put them in an impossible position, as
the difficulties experienced with UK Online's Citizenspace debating area
have already proven.
They would be considered irresponsible if they failed to monitor the
message boards to ensure that obscene, racist and other 'difficult'
speech is purged from their site, but this can easily be presented by
others as the government "censoring free speech". It also means that the
government will tend to concentrate on its own discussion groups and
ignore thriving discussions happening elsewhere.
I would suggest that the government instead encourages third party sites
to set up their own debates on a given subject, links to them directly
from its own pages and participates directly if the number of
participants exceeds a certain threshold. As a service to the public
(and to cover itself) it could label the discussions it links to as
either 'moderated', for BBC-style moderation; 'lightly moderated' for
lighter moderation which only removes the most offensive stuff but might
allow swearing for example; or 'unmoderated'. It could also give
browsers a rough idea of how busy a particular forum is, and whether it
is merely being monitored by the government or whether they are
participating.
It should also always make clear who from the government is either
reading the boards directly or reading summaries, and what their powers
are. And when a decision is made and online discussion helped to inform
that decision, it is vital that this information is also highlighted in
whatever report is published.
The policy consultation asks whether key individuals in government
responsible for a given policy should be individually addressable. While
this is superficially appealing, it risks over-loading the people
responsible. It also ironically reduces openness and transparency as
messages sent directly to the government can't be seen or discussed by
other interested parties. Of course there may still be a place for
anonymous contributions (and people can always post anonymously to
message boards) but it is best where possible that all contributions to
a debate can be read by all participants.
Of course, the "solution" to e-participation doesn't lie largely with
government, since the public by and large doesn't trust the government
to deliver it. For e-participation to become widely valued, it needs to
be well- signposted by existing media outlets.
Organisations like the BBC and newspapers like the Guardian could have
an important role to play here in providing a more complete guide to the
political process than the government could provide. They could guide
people wanting to make a difference to the right body - whether this
meant using the government's own process or joining (or forming) a
pressure group. 'CitizensConnection.net'
(http://www.citizensconnection.net) from the independent educational
organisation Common Purpose is an excellent example that is already up
and running.
The government's e-democracy initiative could consider itself a success
when independent third parties started suggesting it would be more
effective to participate in online debate than to take to the streets.
And if people found that an easier route to existing systems of
consultation still didn't result in change, they might be more willing
to push for the kind of broader democratic reform that cyber-utopians
crave.
NOTE: David Brake http://davidbrake.org is a journalist and an Internet
consultant specialising in the public and voluntary sectors. He manages
a weblog at http://blog.org
[Section three ends.]
* SPECIAL NOTICE: E-ACCESS BULLETIN
- THE NEWSLETTER ON ACCESSIBILITY.
The Disability Discrimination Act means ensuring accessibility of web
sites is a legal as well as a moral obligation for public and private
sector bodies.
Our sister publication E-Access Bulletin delivers news, features and
opinion about overcoming the digital access barriers faced by the
visually impaired community, in a free monthly email.
To subscribe send an e-mail to [log in to unmask] with 'subscribe
eab' in the subject header. Or see: http://www.e-accessibility.com
[Special notice ends.]
* SECTION FOUR: INTERNATIONAL
- US SECURITY.
BROTHERLINESS AND BUNKERS.
by William Mead [log in to unmask]
Experts from the CIA, National Security Agency, Department of Defense
and the Department of Justice came together last month in "City of
Brotherly Love", Philadelphia, to consider information sharing and US
security (http://www.cesfederal.com/ishs).
One might have expected a sense of enhanced homeland security to ooze
from every presentation, but instead one heard threaded throughout the
sessions phrases like 'bunker mentality', 'interagency hard-sell',
'mandated standards', 'agency stovepipes', 'no interoperability among
first responders', 'lack of integration', 'no media coordination', and
'widespread critical infrastructure vulnerability'.
Stephen Gale, Director of Organizational Dynamics for the University of
Pennsylvania, propounded two chilling exercise scenarios. He and three
colleagues were granted access to "a building" with operational control
over electrical power data systems at a critical infrastructure point.
He said: "Within 30 minutes, with nominal computer skills, we could have
shut down the entire eastern seaboard electrical grid for two years." Dr
Gale said the real nightmare of the war against terrorism is that 90 per
cent of the US state's vulnerabilities are not under government control,
with some multi-national and foreign-owned.
Dr Gale's second scenario involved the coordinated bombing of selected
chemical cars within a train that alone would constitute a "spill", but
together could produce a highly toxic gas plume. Such an incident could
easily be accomplished since most chemical cars are lined up for
delivery according to where they are going, not what is in them. Jeff
Gerald, technical manager of the Homeland Security Advanced Concept
Technology Demonstration (http://www.homelandsecurityactd.org), eerily
reproduced this scenario in a documentary style presentation that sent
chills throughout the assemblage. "It's ironic to me", said Gerald "that
the title of this conference, information sharing, presents both the
problem and the solution".
Seventh District Pennsylvania Congressman Curt Weldon lambasted the
federal government, including Congress, for failing to act on critical
data-mining and intelligence integration proposals that he and others
wrote years before the terrorist attacks. Indeed, calls for a National
Intelligence Fusion Center to "cross- pollinate" intelligence
information has been widely argued among experts within the homeland
security community of interest.
Shabtai Shavit, former head of the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad,
felt that "risk takers", willing to by- pass the chain of command,
served the dynamics of intelligence systems better than information
systems analysts. According to Mr. Shavit, "The flagship of intelligence
is human. It is the only profession whose task is to ask questions."
While there still seem to be significant hurdles to be overcome among
the intelligence community, a ray of hope for progress seemed to emerge
in the realm of technology standards. The impetus there rests in the use
of two fundamental web architectures - XML (Extensible Markup Language)
and GIS (Geographic Information Systems).
Steven Cooper, chief information officer for the Office of Homeland
Security, articulated the need to use technologies that could provide
interoperability among governments. "We don't want to invest dollars if
we already have something we can build on", said Cooper. "The tendency
to duplicate existing information- sharing efforts is a major risk
facing hundreds of agencies at all levels of government, as they race to
connect the dots. It doesn't make sense".
Susan Kalweit of the National Emergency Management Association (NEMA)
noted that GIS is "a natural" for mapping vulnerabilities, identifying
critical infrastructure and coordinating first responder activities.
"The problem is that with 9/11 we can no longer merely promote spatial
data integration", said Kalweit. "We must mandate it".
The conference's Training and Education track found that 'First
responders' to an emergency - local state and emergency services nearest
to an incident - can draw on a plethora of training and educational
opportunities provided by federal agencies.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, for example, has developed
comprehensive training programs for homeland security awareness,
critical incident management and response efforts
(http://www.atf.treas.gov/training/arsonex.htm). The Joint Military
Intelligence College
(http://www.dia.mil/Jmic) has also established a virtual university
architecture that provides a full spectrum of "anytime, anywhere"
collaborative environments for community homeland security training.
The track on 'Critical information needs of the first responder' was the
most crucial of the conference yet raised the most cause for concern.
This was because, although emergency management agencies throughout the
nation are working hard to prepare responders for the next terrorist
attack in the areas of data flow, training, mutual aid agreements and
operations support, there was a profound absence of leadership from the
federal agencies assembled. The states, cities, counties and
municipalities are struggling with the real work of homeland security
almost entirely on their own.
The results of a survey of state homeland security directors conducted
by Kendra Stewart of Eastern Kentucky University showed a majority of
the respondents listing "the lack of federal direction as a major factor
limiting their state's response to 9/11."
The National Governors Association recently issued a brief, State's
Homeland Security Priorities (http://fastlink.headstar.com/nga),
outlining several strategic priorities and issues of concern. Among
those cited that have direct federal implications were state input into
the National Homeland Security Strategy; coordinating efforts by all
levels of government; adequate wireless spectrum; rebuilding the
nation's public health system to address 21st Century threats; adequate
federal funding; protection of sensitive security information; secure
ports of entry and integrating federal command systems into existing
state and local incident command systems.
The current deadlocked status of the legislation which the President has
proposed to create a new Department of Homeland Security (see
http://www.govexec.com/homeland) does not sufficiently explain the
absence of leadership by the federal government in ameliorating these
critical issues.
NOTE: William Mead is a web developer and e-government columnist for the
American Society for Public Administration (http://www.aspanet.org).
[Section four ends.]
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ISSN 1476-6310
* COPYRIGHT NOTICE.
- Copyright 2002 Headstar Ltd.
Regular circulation or reproduction of the bulletin by third parties is
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* PERSONNEL
- EDITORIAL.
Editor - Dan Jellinek [log in to unmask]
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Reporter - Tamara Fletcher [log in to unmask]
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[Issue ends.]
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