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Finding Online Government Information

Posted on: Sunday, 2 April 2006, 06:00 CDT

By Lewis, Paul

If you need government information or must transact business with the government, the Web portal FirstGov.gov should be your first stop.

The United States federal government has been described as the largest information machine in the world. Each agency and subagency gathers, manages, and produces information in support of its mission and to inform citizens about their operations, programs, and services. The Internet and the Web are now key tools for distributing government information, with just about every agency having some sort of presence on the Web. As a result, government publications and data are much more accessible and useful than ever before.

Navigating the world of online government information in the early days of the Web presented problems because it was difficult to know where to start searching among the various federal agency Web sites. Today, however, if you need government information or must transact business with the government, the place to begin your search is the federal government's FirstGov.gov Web portal.

FirstGov was designed to provide a free, easily searchable, central location to access government information and services on the Web. Since going online in September 2000, the FirstGov Web portal has become the number one destination for researching United States government information. FirstGov is maintained by the U.S. General Services Administration in collaboration with 22 other federal agencies. The site has won numerous awards for its customer- centered focus. FirstGov is also available in a Spanish language version at http://firstgov.gov/Espanol/ index.shtml.

Areas of Interest

The FirstGov Web site addresses the needs of specific audiences with four main sections devoted to citizens, business and nonprofit organizations, federal employees, and government-to- government cooperative technology initiatives. The business and nonprofit organization area offers a rich set of links to such topics as buying and selling to the government; launching, managing, and growing a business; state economic development programs and services; socioeconomic statistics; laws and regulations; taxes; and financial assistance programs.

FirstGov also provides a number of other navigation and search tools. You can browse by organization in an A to Z agency index and by executive, legislative, or judicial branch agency listings. FirstGov also points to state and local government and selected nonprofit association Web sites. The site offers an excellent Web search engine which searches the full text of millions of government pages and documents posted on government Web sites in Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and Adobe portable document (pdf) and other formats. There is also an extensive list of frequently asked questions with detailed answers to those questions.

Citizens and businesses can also keep up-to-date with new information by signing up for any of a wide number of subject- oriented electronic newsletters offered through the FirstGov portal. FirstGov also points to new technology resources for distributing news and information being deployed by government agencies. For example, a number of federal agencies have begun utilizing podcasts and RSS (really simple syndication).

Podcasting involves converting audio recordings of news releases, conference programs, radio programs, etc., and distributing them via the Web as downloadable files for listening on personal computers or handheld media players like the popular IPOD music player. RSS is a method of summarizing news from continuously updated Web sites that can be delivered to RSS reader software on a PC. It provides a fast, efficient method to stay up-to-date on specially focused topics. The FirstGov site offers comprehensive listings of agency podcast and RSS feeds.

Cross-Agency Portals

In recent years the federal government has taken advantage of subject-oriented Web domain names to create cross-agency Web portals that help researchers to drill down to needed information on a particular topic. A few cross-agency portals are listed below. You can expect to see more subject-oriented government portals coming online in the future.

Arts.Gov

http://www.arts.gov

Business.Gov

http://www.business.gov

Census.Gov

http://www.census.gov

Consumer.Gov

http://www.consumer.gov

Fed Stats.Gov

http://www.fedstats.gov

Disability Info.Gov

http://www.disabilityinfo.gov

Forms.Gov

http://www.forms.gov

Grants.Gov

http://www.grants.gov

Health.Gov

http://www.health.gov

Humanities.Gov

http://www.humanities.gov

Kids.Gov

http://www.kids.gov

On Guard Online.Gov

http://onguardonline.gov

Recalls.Gov

http://www.recalls.gov

Regulations.Gov

http://www.regulations.gov

Science.Gov

http://www.science.gov

Seniors.Gov

http://www.seniors.gov

Students.Gov

http://www.students.gov

Student Jobs.Gov

http://www.studentjobs.gov

Womens Health.Gov

http://womenshealth.gov

State Government Site

South Carolina's official state government Web portal recently underwent a major renovation. Like FirstGov, the purpose is to provide a central location for state government news, listings of agency Web sites offering online services, and access to publications and data produced by South Carolina state government agencies. It was formerly located at http://myscgov.com. You can now reach it at http://www.sc.gov or http://www.southcarolina.gov.

Dealing with the Drawbacks

As is so often the case with technology, there are some issues of concern about the government's embrace of the Web as a tool for informing and serving the public. Federal and state governments have substantially reduced distribution of printed publications in favor of online distribution. For example, the U.S. Census Bureau printed almost none of the population and housing reports from the 2000 Census which they historically printed for previous decennial censuses, choosing instead to offer electronic versions of the documents from their Web site. There's no disputing this saves trees and taxpayer dollars, but some historians and other public data users believe what could happen is the creation of a possibly huge memory hole for the public record which could have dire consequences for citizens and governments.

Federal regulations provide guidelines for retention, cataloging, and archiving of federal agency publications. States have their own regulations, as well, but documents posted on government Web sites often disappear without notice and without a trace back to where the publication might be found in any format. Decisions about what is posted are often made by Webmasters who generally have no training or interest in maintaining adequate archives.

There is also a concern about diminishing access for many citizens who won't benefit from the efficiency of online government information and services if they are unable to use or cannot afford to purchase the necessary technology for themselves. Another problem is that some agencies, seeing a potential revenue stream, seek to charge citizens for access to certain publications and data. This is indeed unfortunate, since taxpayer dollars already paid for the collection, maintenance, and production of these resources and the cost of online dissemination via a Web site is minimal.

To help address access issues, a network of federal and state depository libraries in South Carolina and across the nation are staffed with librarians specially trained in the use of the technology and methods for effectively accessing government information in all formats. The primary purpose of these depository libraries is to serve all citizens who are seeking government information. In South Carolina there are 20 federal depository libraries housed in public libraries and college libraries scattered in communities across the state. Anyone who needs assistance with access to government information and services may contact their local depository librarian for help.

All organizations, whether they be public or private sector, have at least three things in common regardless of their official mission: they collect, manage, and disseminate information. How well they accomplish these things is one measure of how successful they are. As citizens, we can certainly take pride in the efforts by governments in recent years to put technology to work to serve the public good. There is always room, however, for improvement, and citizens should become more informed about how governments are putting technology to work.

"The site has won numerous awards for its customer-centered focus."

"Federal and state governments have substantially reduced distribution of printed publications in favor of online distribution."

"...citizens should become more informed about how governments are putting technology to work."

Paul Lewis is a reference librarian at the University of South Carolina-Aiken who specializes in government information resources.

Copyright Moore School of Business Apr-Jun 2006

Source: Business and Economic Review

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