Importance of Mobile Technology in Community Development

In the public sector, community development departments are measured on several key things: citizen satisfaction, zoning strategy, planning and licensing, and permitting guidelines.

With an easy-to-use interface for citizens and built-in GIS technology, community development software can help your team streamline workflows and improve service delivery. But not all community development solutions are created equal. 

Some integrate with geographic information systems (GIS), some don’t. Some come with mobile functionality that can optimize your processes and save time. The trick is finding the solution that meets your needs.

Mobile technology lets your team interact directly with citizens to foster trust, process requests faster, and manage city resources more effectively. In this article, we’ll discuss the benefits of modernizing community management systems and some success stories of governments who already made the transition.

How Mobile Technology Modernizes Community Development

The best (and most modern) community development software includes mobile technology. As a community developer, it lets you and other stakeholders access, update and share information remotely. It lets you streamline the inspection process.

Mobile technology empowers your team to make decisions faster and coordinate with other departments easier. For instance, inspectors can submit reports directly from the field, reducing paperwork and processing times. Planners can update and refer to development plans on-site to ensure everything is implemented accurately.

At the end of the day, public sector mobile solutions improve team productivity and service delivery. Keep reading to learn how it simplifies five responsibilities of community developers.

Inspections

By allowing inspectors to enter data directly into their mobile devices on-site, community development software eliminates the need for redundant paperwork and reduces the risk of data entry errors. It also lets your team attach photos and videos, making it easier to document and report issues immediately. 

Field inspection tools like community development software may also come with GIS. This lets inspectors access historical data, previous inspection reports and regulatory information in the field. With a comprehensive view of the project, they can arrive on-site prepared and make informed decisions on-the-fly. Any issues identified during inspections can be uploaded and shared with other departments, leading to faster repairs and ongoing monitoring. 

With mobile functionality, you can speed up the inspection process and increase its accuracy. You can make inspections more thorough and effective, fostering higher standards of compliance and safety within your community.

Permitting

With the mobile functionality of community development software, your team can review, approve or request additional information on permit applications directly from their devices, regardless of location. This speeds up the permitting process and reduces wait times.

Not only that, the software keeps applicants informed throughout the permitting process with real-time updates and notifications. This keeps your email inbox uncluttered, saves time and fosters transparency between public officials and residents. 

By providing access to historical data and related documents, mobile solutions also ensure your decisions are well-informed and compliant with local regulations.

Citizen Engagement

The right community development solutions improve citizen engagement, which should be measured by the quality of communication, not the quantity of it. 

Mobile technology makes interactions with local government services more accessible and convenient. Through mobile apps, residents can easily report issues, request services and provide feedback from their smartphones, creating a positive communication channel between your team and the community.

It also lets you push notifications about local events or permitting updates directly to people’s mobile devices, which improves citizen satisfaction. Ready to empower citizens and increase transparency? The right public sector mobile solution can help.

Real-Time Access

Mobile technology lets community development leaders retrieve and update information instantly, from any location, so you are always equipped with the most current data during fieldwork or while in transit. Imagine being able to access maps, previous inspection reports, regulatory information, permitting documents and more at any time. It’s a game changer.

Whether it’s accessing land records, zoning information, or real-time data from other municipal departments, mobile access helps your team make decisions with the latest information available. This is particularly beneficial in the field, during emergencies, or in public meetings, when real-time communication with residents and other departments is critical.

Field Communication

Last but not least, mobile technology improves field communication for community development leaders. With mobile access to community development software, field personnel can communicate updates, changes, or issues in real-time – directly from their job sites.

Furthermore, real-time communication and file-sharing capabilities allow field staff to address issues as they arise, consulting with office-based personnel or other departments on the spot. If an inspector encounters an unexpected compliance issue, for example, he can immediately communicate with permitting officials to determine next steps.

Effective field communication keeps your team (and even other departments) aligned, reducing misunderstandings and delays. This connectivity supports a more cohesive response to community needs and increases the efficiency of community development projects.

Success Stories of Local Governments Adopting Mobile Solutions

Greeley, CO

In the City of Greeley, CO, there are 150 people using CentralSquare Community Development for asset tracking, building permits, and projects. After adopting our solution, they became about 95% paperless, which simplifies processes and saves money on office/storage space.

One of the biggest benefits, however, is their increased availability to the community. Greeley went from normal business hours – eight hours a day, Monday through Friday – to being open 24/7/365. So citizens can apply for permits and projects at any time of day, at their convenience. 

Applicants can even pay online via credit card. The City of Greeley used to collect 100% of payment in-house. Now the vast majority of payments are completed online, letting them accomplish more with less staff.

Aurora, IL

As the second-largest city in the state of Illinois, the City of Aurora has over 1200 employees who depend on a reliable system for community management. They use CentralSquare’s Community Development for permitting processes, licensing, projects, development, code enforcement and more.

With Community Development’s online portal, Aurora can provide more efficient services to its residents, including 24/7 access to permit requests and online payment. Our software also comes with real-time communication, so Aurora can send automatic notifications via email about project status and updates. This has increased transparency between citizens and public administrators.

How CentralSquare’s Mobile Technology Is Empowering Public Sector Teams

Many local governments, including Aurora and Greeley, have seen the benefits of both community development software and mobile technology. In our day and age, people expect an easy user experience. They expect online payments and permitting applications. By providing these services, you can improve citizen satisfaction and trust.

Not only that, the job of community developers necessitates digital tools that can be used in the field. Access to job-critical information in real-time, as well as the ability to streamline inspection workflows in the field, is too important to ignore mobile solutions like CentralSquare Community Development.

With our Community Development mobile app, your team can view records and carry out inspections in the field. You can track permit workflows with a customizable permitting module that follows your agency’s procedures. All this and much more is possible. Schedule a discovery call today to learn how our software can help your department optimize processes and build trust with citizens.