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Ben Miller

Ben Miller is the associate editor of data and business for Government Technology. His reporting experience includes breaking news, business, community features and technical subjects.

News

Budget Trailer Bills Authorize Data Sharing for Diseases, Homelessness

The bills, both signed by the governor, allow the California Department of Public Health and the Interagency Council on Homelessness to expand data sharing in their respective areas.

Insider
July 23, 2024
· Ben Miller
News

Budget Allocates $10.4M to Hire SI for State Payroll System Project

The State Controller’s Office, already out to bid for a system integrator for the massive modernization effort, plans to release three more solicitations this year to support its eventual system integrator.

Insider
July 17, 2024
· Ben Miller
News

To Buy AI, Government Needs to See Big Changes — Fast

At a recent Bay Area event bringing together public- and private-sector leaders in government technology, many spoke about how hiring struggles are making AI both more appealing and more difficult to adopt.

December 04, 2023
· Ben Miller
News

At State Toxic Control Agency, Data Work Begets IT and Culture Changes

The California Department of Toxic Substances Control recently hired its first chief data officer. A host of changes, including new technology to better enable data use among employees, has followed in short order.

Insider
November 22, 2023
· Ben Miller
News

Secretary of State Puts Statewide Ballot Tracking System Out to Bid

The state has offered email, text and call-based notifications of ballot status to voters since 2020. For 2024, the California Secretary of State is asking for quotes for the 58-county system.

Insider
October 27, 2023
· Ben Miller
News

OSI Seeks Information for Cross-Department Data Matching

The Health and Human Services Agency solution would need to match more than 60 million personal records in different databases across 13 departments.

Insider
July 07, 2023
· Ben Miller
News

Sacramento CIO to Step Down; City Seeks Replacement

The city manager hopes to hire Maria MacGunigal’s replacement by the time she leaves in April.

February 09, 2023
· Ben Miller
News

Major County Tech Leader to Become CIO of Northwest State

The award-winning, longtime C-level executive will leave California to become chief information officer of the state where he first became a technology chief.

Insider
June 10, 2021
· Ben Miller
News

Former Digital Services Chief Opens Consultancy

Having recently stepped down as San Rafael’s director of digital service and open government, Rebecca Woodbury is continuing her work at her new company, Department of Civic Things. Her focus: helping small jurisdictions change.

March 01, 2021
· Ben Miller
News

Chatbots' Role in Government Services on the Rise

The idea is that chatbots, which typically use some form of AI algorithm, can handle common questions and leave less common or more complicated questions for human staff to answer. They’ve made inroads in, among other places, Placer and San Joaquin counties.

September 22, 2020
· Ben Miller
News

Coronavirus: 2 CIOs Explain How They're Enabling Telework

Two key California cities' chief information officers discuss the solutions they're using to enable municipal employees to work remotely during "shelter in place" orders.

March 25, 2020
· Ben Miller
News

Startup Wants to Work With Cities to Look at Mobility Data

A Palo Alto tech company aims to use open source technology to help local agencies aggregate and analyze dockless mobility and rideshare data.

October 01, 2019
· Ben Miller
News

City's Second Data Center a Gateway to Change, Modernization

Intended to offer redundancy, the facility now highlights the possibilities in a cloud-forward posture, a remote workforce, improved backups and more.

August 29, 2019
· Ben Miller
News

VIDEO: Why Innovation May Be Easier at Small Public Safety Agencies

It might seem counterintuitive, but in the public safety space, tech startup entrepreneurs say that big agencies with big budgets might not be the most innovative. Many like the creativity and agility of small agencies.

November 18, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Firm Closing Only California Office, But Staff Will Remain

A recently formed business that was created from the merger of three gov tech companies has announced that it's closing its only California office in March — but it's expecting that most of its employees in the state will remain and work remotely.

October 25, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

IT Leader Jumps From Public to Private Sector

A longtime local government official who led technology, innovation and community development efforts in several cities is joining Oracle to work on a renewed push into public-sector software. The move brings Oracle a recognized local government voice in the San Francisco Bay Area, as well as a person who has a lot of experience with a company Oracle recently began competing directly against: Accela.

October 21, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Data Sharing: What's the Worst that Could Happen?

Startups are producing lots of transit data that could help inform government policy — but not everyone agrees on what should be shared.

September 13, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Startup Using Tech to Reduce Court No-Shows

As California replaces its money-bail system with "risk assessments" to determine who is most likely to fail to appear for their court dates, Uptrust is expanding its tool that it says helps people stay in compliance.

September 12, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

As Cities Push Back Against E-Scooters, One Company Launches "GovTech Platform"

The e-scooter company Bird's offering is tailored toward some of the exact complaints of cities like San Francisco and San Jose.

September 10, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Scooter Firm Wants to Play Nice With Cities

As electric scooters have proliferated in California cities this year, a lot of local governments and citizens have voiced increasing concern about some problems their riders can cause — blocking sidewalk access for people with disabilities, riding in places they aren’t supposed to and putting pedestrians in danger. Now Bird, which is based in Santa Monica and has deployed its scooters in about 40 U.S. cities, has released a tool meant to help local government address some of those problems.

Insider
August 29, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Napa Sees Tech as Magnet for Engaged Tourism

The city of Napa is trying to add a tech-enabled, personalized experience to its local tourism scene, like what the tech giants of San Francisco and Silicon Valley have already made commonplace in visitors’ lives.

August 28, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

CEO Steps Down, Company Embraces Microsoft Azure for Its Future

The CEO was only on board for a little more than a year, but a lot happened in that time. Now, as he leaves, the company is taking on a major cloud computing partnership.

July 01, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Accela Launches Apps to Help Cities Plan, Develop

The company said transparency, among other functionalities, can help reduce the amount of time it takes for a city to approve development.

June 27, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Accela's Daihl Stepping Down from CEO Role

Ed Daihl, chief executive officer of the gov tech company Accela, is stepping down after a little more than a year at the helm and will shift to an advisory role.

June 25, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

With GitHub Buy, Is Microsoft Moving to Open Source?

There was a time when Microsoft meant the opposite of open source. The question of whether that’s still true is the crux of the disagreement between open source believers who are excited by the tech giant’s recent $7.5 billion acquisition of GitHub and those who are dismayed by it.

June 20, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Digital License Plates: Opportunities Abound

The city of Sacramento is piloting digital license plates on a couple dozen of its electric cars, and the potential benefits of the dynamic new devices are many, including safety, diagnostics and public information.

June 04, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Long Beach Finds Data Sharing Is Worth the Struggle

City Innovation head Tracy Colunga highlights what happens when multiple departments agree to share data that uncovers the high impact of repeat offenders.

May 31, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Here Are 7 Startups That Are Working with Cities

Here's a look at some of the companies that drew attention at last week's Bridge SF conference in San Francisco. They're doing business with, among others, cities in the Golden State.

May 28, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Startups at Conference Tout Government Applications

The Startup in Residence program, which matches tech companies with local government workers to help them solve public-sector problems, wants to grow a lot bigger. Today, some California success stories were showcased at a conference.

May 21, 2018
· Ben Miller
News

Startup Gives Governments a Way to Test-Drive Tech

A new Silicon Valley startup called UrbanLeap is putting together a cloud-based platform for government — especially local government — to pilot-test products and services. It may be the first such product on the market.

April 05, 2018
· Ben Miller