Creating a Citizen-Friendly City Hall: An Evaluation of the Chattanooga Initiative

Thomas JC¹*

1. Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Atlanta, Georgia, USA

With their many departments, functions, and telephone numbers, municipal governments can resemble impenetrable mazes to their citizen-owners. New technologies offer the potential to transform that reality. This paper reports on two such new technologies currently being implemented by the City of Chattanooga, Tennessee (USA): (1) a 311 call center, offering a single, easily-remembered phone number for citizen inquiries about issues or problems related to municipal government, and (2) the “chattanoogaCITIZEN” municipal Web site, providing another vehicle for registering complaints as well as for tracking municipal progress in responding and for obtaining all manner of information on City Hall and the city more generally. Although both technologies have been adopted elsewhere, Chattanooga may be unique in implementing the two in an integrated pairing.

The purpose of this paper is to report on the success of these twin initiatives in engaging the residents of Chattanooga in the workings of their government. The paper will initially describe how Chattanooga has implemented the two new technologies—how each operates, what problems have arisen, how the technologies relate to each other, and the like. Separate sections will then assess citizen engagement with the new technologies—how many people use each, who they are, and how they feel about their experience. The conclusion will discuss lessons for other cities.

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