Children’s Health Care Bill Expanded
Yesterday, the House voted on the expansion of the Children’s Health Care Bill with the support of Barack Obama. This bill will increase the coverage of insurance to 4 million uninsured children. It is expected that Obama will sign it within a few days after taking office and then, the Senate might act on it soon. According to the news article, the bill has a provision that would permit states to reinstate the health insurance benefits of legal immigrants. At present, legal immigrants have a five-year waiting period (after their initial entry into the U.S.) before they can take advantage of Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. Continue reading
Wiretapping Program – Soon to be Legalized by Intelligence Court
Today, New York Times reported that the Wiretapping Program will be legalized by a federal intelligence court. It will authorize both the president and Congress to monitor overseas phone calls and e-mail messages without a court order, although this may include Americans’ personal communications. The report states that “in validating the government’s wide authority to collect foreign intelligence, it may offer legal credence to the Bush administration’s repeated assertions that the president has constitutional authority to act without specific court approval in ordering national security eavesdropping.” Continue reading
5 Days to Government Information Liberation
Yesterday I said I was going to talk about the Government Information Online project as yet another example of how government information librarians can work together across geography and institutional lines. In a nutshell, since February 11, 2008, about 26 libraries (private, public, academic and state libraries) have been using OCLC's questionpoint software to answer email questions and host chat sessions from the public. In fact, I am going to be on chat duty in about 45 minutes from now. Here are some preliminary figures: Total number of sessions registered on the system for emails and chats: 6,121. This averages about 500 sessions per month. Total for emails: 3,713 Total for chats: 2,408 February: 693 390: emails 303: chats March: 573 315: emails 258: chats April: 612 353: emails 259: chats May: 492 314: emails 178: chats June: 512 295: emails 217: chats July: 460 281: emails 179: chats August: 411 272: emails 139: chats September: 596 382: emails 214: chats October: 787 495: emails 292: chats November: 586 389: emails 197: chats December: 399 227: emails 172: chats I think in terms of numbers and quality of service, this project stands as an excellent example of how librarians from a multitude of institutions can reach out to the public. The response, and support from the institutions and GPO, have been excellent. I will speak a bit more about the service implications of this kind of model tomorrow. Continue reading
International Perspective: Making Government More Transparent
The government consulting firm Accenture has released a report in which they analyze their research to help public service organizations around the world serve citizens better.
- Leadership in Customer Service Report: Creating Shared Responsibility for Better Outcomes. Accenture. 2009.
Video Games for Recruiting – Army Experience Center
CNN reports that the Army Experience Center located in the Franklin Mills Mall in Philadelphia is using video games to attract new recruits. It is a 14,500 square foot facility that has 60 computers which offers virtual reality games for the youth. This new marketing strategy has been employed to educate the general public about the careers available in the Army. Continue reading