December 18, 1999

White House Announces Online Initiatives

By REBECCA FAIRLEY RANEY

ice President Al Gore on Friday urged all federal agencies to place government publications and information online and announced plans for the White House to undertake a yearlong study of the feasibility of Internet voting.

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The White House initiative seeks to create a "virtual government field office" that would serve as a single resource for citizens to search for government information. One goal is to make forms available for the 500 top government services by December 2000, which would "eliminate the need to stand in government lines," according to a news release issued by the vice president's office.

As part of the initiative, Gore encouraged the use of technology to improve health care, education and responses to natural disasters.

The vice president also released a report on how the Clinton administration has promoted e-commerce, which details steps to promote privacy measures online and encourage the growth of the Internet.

The initiatives were presented as two executive memoranda signed by President Clinton, which are not binding on federal agencies. The news release said that each initiative "moves us beyond the world of bits and bytes and into the fabric of our society."

The move was greeted by a mixture of enthusiasm and skepticism by advocates of online government efforts.

"Hallelujah! It's about time," said Steven Clift, chairman of the nonprofit Minnesota E-Democracy since 1994 and former coordinator of Minnesota government services online. "Citizens need a single, well-organized point for all of government in the United States -- state, local and federal."

Related Articles California Commission Sees Big Obstacles to Internet Voting (December 15, 1999)

The announcement that White House officials want to undertake a study on Internet voting followed the news earlier this week that members of the California Internet Voting Task Force, the first deliberative state body to evaluate the issue, were reluctant to recommend that the state allow voters to cast ballots online from homes and offices in the next few years. Members of the commission said they were concerned about viruses damaging home computers, which no secure transmission can control.

Members of the commission, who have been studying the issue for nine months, will recommend in a report to be released next month that state election officials consider, as a test phase, using Internet-connected machines at polling places. To allow the use of Internet voting technology, most states must change their laws, and no state is currently considering such legislation.

Clift cautioned that because of the significant technological and political obstacles to Internet voting, the emphasis on that issue in the White House memorandum could backfire.

"We're setting ourselves up for a great failure on the hype meter," Clift said. "People will say, 'We tried Internet politics and it didn't work,' when online voting is 1 percent of online democracy."

A better approach, he said, would be to "look to where the most action is, which is participatory democracy. It is what happens between elections that is fundamental."

Most of the White House initiative was dedicated to encouraging federal agencies to use technology to make their information and services more accessible. However, because only half of American households have Internet access, that idea troubles many advocates of equal access.

To address that issue, the vice president's news release emphasized the Clinton Administration's efforts to invest in community technology centers and to place computers in classrooms.

Even so, giving people computers may not be enough, some observers say.

These days, government agencies often present information online that is impenetrable to untrained users. With that consideration, any initiative to present government information on the Internet should require agencies to make their data easy to search and also make contingencies for computer training programs, said Andy Carvin, a senior associate for the Benton Foundation.

White House initiative may nudge the agencies that are lagging.

"If everyone in America was connected to the Internet tomorrow, you still need to be able to have a system of training," Carvin said.

For example, he said, many people find searching for information about Congressional bills on the Library of Congress's Thomas online service difficult.

"It's a treasure trove of information," Carvin said, "but unless you're trained to use it and adept at Congressional parlance, it can be painfully difficult for people to use."

Still, the White House initiative to encourage federal agencies to place information online may nudge the agencies that are lagging, said Ari Schwartz, a policy analyst for the nonprofit Center for Democracy and Technology. For example, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, which employs many technologists, has maintained exemplary information online, while other agencies offer substantially less information.

"Do we let the Department of the Interior fall behind because there aren't as many geeks there?" Schwartz said. "When the public attention is placed on what agencies are doing online, agencies do want to act."

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Related Sites
These sites are not part of The New York Times on the Web, and The Times has no control over their content or availability.

• White House

• report: "Towards Digital eQuality"

• Minnesota E-Democracy

• Benton Foundation

• Thomas

• Center for Democracy and Technology

• National Aeronautics and Space Administration

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Rebecca Fairley Raney at rfr@nytimes.com welcomes your comments and suggestions.

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