Projects

Kingsburg Connection

City of Kingsburg
Kingsburg, California

Population: 11,300

Implemented: October 2008

• GORequest
• GOEnforce

Project Description

The City of Kingsburg, located in California's fertile Central Valley, faced a dilemma common to many communities struggling to keep up with a growing population and a backlog of code enforcement cases.

Customer Service

The City relied on an antiquated database for logging citizen requests, complaints, and questions, which required staff members to manually fill-in a form, route it to the right person, log it into the database, and then make sure it was handled.  This often led to frustration for the citizen, since there was no way to track the issue and notify the citizen when it was handled.  Citizens frequently called to check on the status of their request, and became frustrated when staff couldn't provide them with a timely answer.  Staff increasingly recognized that there had to be a better way to provide customer service.

The City researched other communities that had embraced customer service technology, specifically Citizen Relationship Management software that provided a highly efficient system to enter, assign, and track requests.  This research led to the City's selection of Government Outreach's GORequest system, which has proven highly successful in dramatically improving the agency's customer service.  City staff report that the implementation was extremely smooth, and employees quickly began realizing the benefits provided by the system.

Of special note is the Kingsburg Connection language translator, which allows citizens to communicate with the City in any of several dozen languages including Spanish, Vietnamese, Filipino, and many others.  This feature is proving to be a valuable tool to help the City provide a higher level of service to its diverse population.

Code Enforcement

Like many communities, the City of Kingsburg faces a growing code enforcement caseload.  All cases are entered by a single staff member, and the City's implementation of Government Outreach's GOEnforce automated code enforcement software has resulted in huge gains in efficiency.  The entire code enforcement staff can instantly check on past cases, pending actions, and all related casework documents such as photographs and letters.  The system can be accessed via mobile devices, which represents a tremendous improvement over the City's previous office-only access to code enforcement files.