Across the nation, cities and states are harnessing the power of the latest innovations in cloud computing, the Internet of Things, analytics and big data to create a better future for citizens.
To take advantage of these innovations and deliver a better user experience, the California City of Vallejo Planning and Development Services Department selected Oracle Community Development to implement online permit services for constituents.
Oracle’s Community Development solution is helping the city of Vallejo manage the entire planning entitlement, building permit, and code enforcement process. This includes filing applications, final inspection and enforcement action.
These new online services will greatly expand the ease of doing business with Vallejo’s Planning and Development Services department, while also allowing for projects to be completed and code cases to be resolved faster and more accurately.
During the implementation of this project, the COVID-19 crisis impacted California, but that didn’t stop the city from moving forward as everyone shifted to work remotely. Initially, the project go-live was delayed to the fall, anticipating a return to in-person work. However, the pandemic brought an added incentive to make self-service permits available online, as manual processing by the city was even more difficult with employees working remotely. And the new cloud platform would allow inspectors, contractors and others to be able to continue to conduct their business with the city while working from home.
The city of Vallejo adjusted rapidly, analyzing the permit types in highest demand during the crisis. They identified one frequently used trade permit, and made it available for use in June. This specific, accelerated go-live was possible due to the iterative approach used for the implementation; a number of permits were fully configured and ready for use, and could be deployed immediately, in response to the city’s need.
“Our citizens expect more from their government than ever before. Transacting with us needs to be easy, intuitive, and connected. Public agencies must meet these evolving needs without being limited by our own systems and capacity,” said Anne Cardwell, assistant city manager, city of Vallejo. “Oracle is a true partner for us, making it easier for our staff to install, manage, and modify these new systems while also ensuring both the systems, and the people who operate them, are future-proofed.”
The city expects that the online self-service portal will result in improved financial and operational efficiencies as it increases their ability to facilitate more requests while allowing staff to focus on processing applications instead of assisting customers with routine requests at the permit counter. The remaining permit types will be made available on a phased basis, culminating in the fall.
Oracle is investing in its community development solution in order to help our customers keep pace with today’s digital expectations of constituents. Its solution is reliable, extensible, and easy-to-use, but most importantly is designed to enhance the customer’s experience, offering tools that make the journey through the permitting or service request process predictable and intuitive.
Today, thousands of public sector organizations use Oracle to transform how their constituents engage with government. By providing a full Community Development platform, Oracle provides local governments with a seamless solution to serve all front-office, back-office, and permitting needs.
