The primary purpose of the NTIA planning initiative has been to provide a useful blueprint-a practical plan of action-for extending and improving the public portion of SCIway - South Carolina's segment of the Information Superhighway and for increasing the number of South Carolinians who can access SCIway and the Internet and use these resources effectively. In support of that effort, it is anticipated that the Information Resources Council (IRC) and its Communities of Interest (Figure 8.1) will be addressing many of the issues and recommendations contained in the responses to the five critical questions to which this SCIway Blueprint has been addressed. Specifically, the questions and recommendations that will be submitted to the IRC include:

1. What types of public information and services should be available on SCIway, and how should these resources be developed and maintained?

• The IRC will be requested to consider the creation of an appointed on-line, information access board, according to the recommendations contained in this plan, that would be responsible for managing electronic access to public information generated and gathered by state government agencies.

• The IRC will be asked to consider requesting the drafting of legislation to establish a challenge grant program that helps local governments provide their citizens on-line information and services.

• With the support of the IRC, libraries and school districts should work with local colleges and universities to form network information cooperatives with the buying power necessary to negotiate favorable rates for numerous electronic resources. The IRC will be asked to consider requesting the drafting of legislation that would establish an annual matching fund program that provides additional incentives for the formation and long-term growth of these information co-ops.

2. What is the best way for South Carolina state and local government agencies- including public libraries, colleges and universities, and K-12 schools-to connect to SCIway and the Internet?

• The State Budget and Control Board and its Offices of Information Resources and Research and Statistics and with the support and advice of the IRC, must continue to closely monitor the rapidly changing "technology scene" to insure that the telecommunications infrastructure of the State is effectively designed, managed and operated to take advantage of existing and emerging technologies, as well as, developing competitive telecommunications services provision.

• The South Carolina General Assembly should continue to appropriate funds that enable K-12 public schools to connect to SCINET and the Internet. However, there must be flexibility in the utilization of these funds to include the purchase of personal computers and network equipment. This change would enable poorer schools and school districts to obtain the resources needed to make effective use of dedicated external network connections.

• The IRC will be asked to consider requesting the drafting of legislation to establish a special technology improvement fund for the use of school districts that have property tax bases (resources) below the state average.

• The IRC will be asked to consider requesting the establishment of a one-time grant program that helps county governments pay the start-up and first-year communications costs of connecting all of their library branches to SCIway and the Internet. This program should be designed to take maximum benefit of the Universal Service provisions of 1996 Telecommunications Act.

• The IRC will be asked to consider requesting the drafting of legislation to create matching grant programs that helps local and regional councils of governments provide their citizens on-line information and services, especially public library branches should provide on-site SCIway stations (network or personal computer) that people without access at home or work can use to access SCIway and Internet information resources and services. The grant matching percentage for poorer counties should be less than the percentage required for richer counties.

4. Should South Carolina state and local governments provide network training and support services to South Carolinians who don't know how to use SCIway and the Internet-and if so, how?

• A proposal will be presented to the IRC that include requesting that the South Carolina State Library be funded to provide SCINET and Internet training and support to county librarians, who in turn would be training citizens.

• With the support of the Department of Education and the Commission on Higher Education, a proposal will be presented to the Information Resource Council that would include the offering of credit courses to assist teachers in identifying Internet resources and how to effectively incorporate these resources into the instructional curriculum.

5. How should South Carolina state government plan, coordinate, and promote the development of the public parts of SCIway (including on-line public information and services, network access for government agencies, and public access and training for citizens)?

• The Governor has created the Information Resources Council as the forum in which guidance and direction in the planning, coordination, and promotion of the development of the public portions of SCIway should occur.

• The SCIway Blueprint should be adopted as a benchmark for the Information Resources Council.

8.1 What is the Information Resources Council?

The Information Resources Council has been designed to be an essential component of governmental reform. Restructuring of government has reduced the number of separate, autonomous state agencies from more than 130 in 1990 to less than 40 in 1996. This restructuring is still in progress and is being undertaken across both programmatic and agency lines.

On March 5, 1996, Governor David Beasley created the Information Resources Council by Executive Order. In that Order, the council has been charged to:

• assist agencies in the development and implementation of sound business plans that include the effective and efficient use of information resources and technologies throughout government;

• oversee and coordinate development of statewide policies, strategies, goals and objectives derived from sound business plans for how information resources and technologies shall be planned, managed and used;

• oversee and coordinate development of a statewide information infrastructure that supports the State's strategic goals;

• foster interagency and intergovernmental projects that share staff, budgets, information resources and facilities to plan, collect, process, transmit and store data and information;

• provide a forum that encourages innovation and creativity in the application of information resources and stimulates defining and resolving barriers to efficient and effective development , use , and sharing of information resources among public, private, national, state and local interests; and

• provide impetus to development of integrated statewide networks that cost-effectively facilitate sharing of and access to information, computing, and communications resources.

The Information Resources Council's membership includes four state or local governmental representatives with technology /business manager /programmatic interests; five members representing the private sector with either business or technology interests; and a member of the Governor's Staff and the Executive Director of the Budget and Control Board, serving as ex officio members.

To facilitate the ability of the Council to address a wide variety of issues related to information resources planning, the Council will establish Communities of Interest that broadly represent the fundamental programmatic initiatives (processes) of government--- federal, state, local or regional. ( See Figure 8. 1)

8.2. What Are the Characteristics of Effective Government and How Are These Characteristics Being Promoted in the Information Resources Council and the SCIway Blueprint?

A recent issue of Government Technology enumerated the following characteristics of effective government. (Rita Kidd, "No Excuses", Government Technology September, 1996) In reviewing these characteristics, the role of the Information Resources Council and its membership in developing and promoting these characteristics is addressed.

Characteristics of Effective Government

• Strong, influential agents for change in strategic positions.
• The introduction of competition into the governance structure

The membership of the Information Resources Council includes representatives from the most successful and influential private and public sector enterprises in the State. Each council member is an influential agent for change in the organization that he or she is representing. Both public and private sector representation insures that "best practices" from both settings will be evaluated for utilization.

• A governance structure that defines the legislative process as responsible for enacting clear policy --responsive to constituency needs -- to guide federal/state/county /city staff who are fully accountable for managing government operations.

The restructured and restructuring state government is being driven by constituencies who demand excellence, accountability, and effectiveness. The IRC with its public and private members can direct the promulgation of legislation that effectively addresses "processes" in government that may be difficult to analyze and evaluate from within the traditional agency/programmatic "task-oriented" perspective of government.

• Unprecedented levels of collaboration horizontally and vertically.
• Use of cross-jurisdictional working groups (not committees), committed to "do the right thing"

From Figure 8.1, above, it is obvious that "processes" in government cross agency boundaries. Not as obvious is the vertical element of government which reaches down into local communities. The membership of the IRC includes two representatives of local governmental interests ( this vertical component) and the organization of the Communities of Interest WorkGroups has been directed toward strengthening the horizontal levels of cooperation, planning, research, information resources development, and information sharing. In additional to supporting the horizontal and vertical levels of collaboration within government, the IRC also promotes those same levels of collaboration between the public and the private sectors.

• Sharing and reuse of like applications of technology.

Large database integration projects exist in many areas of government and effective applications need not be "reinvented" in each setting. The Communities of Interest WorkGroups encourage the sharing and development of applications that would have multiple potential sites for utilization. Several such projects are already underway and include imaging, client-tracking, and GIS applications.

• Strong local control and equally strong central coordination.

The strength of local participation and voice in the IRC has been discussed above. The principal staff support to the IRC comes from the State Budget and Control Board, whose responsibilities include central state government coordination and support services. The Budget and Control Board exists to service state and local government needs in a variety ways including human resources, general services, intergovernmental relations, research and statistics, technology infrastructure design, maintenance, planning, and development, just to mention a few.

• An upward spiral in competency and service delivery.
• Performance-based rewards.

Lester Thurow writes that " today, knowledge and skill now stand alone as the only source of competitive advantage. They have become the key ingredient in the late twentieth century's location of economic activity. Silicon Valley and Route 128 are where they are simply because that is where the brainpower is." (Lester Thurow, The Future of Capitalism, 1996 William Morrow and Company.)

South Carolina must develop an educational system that produces "knowledge or process" workers, if it is to be competitive in the 21st century. Teaching technology competencies, and using technology to improve both products and services are essential components of the economic future of the State. What is important in the 21st century will not be becoming a leader in new product technologies, but becoming a leader in new process technologies. In short, doing what needs to be done more efficiently and effectively using technology.

Government and the private sector must work together to create the knowledge or process worker of tomorrow and a system of matching grants as proposed in this plan will go far to promote the connectivity, equipment acquisition, and resource development and training that is critical to developing the necessary technical competencies.

• Business-based planning driving technology strategies and services

Both government and the private sector share many similar business functions such as finance and control, public relations, products and services, and most importantly - the same client base. (See Figure 8.2.) This year, the SCINET Project, a public-private partnership that includes the Office of the Governor, BellSouth, the LightStar Partnership, the Budget and Control Board, and the Department of Education has effectively demonstrated that government and business have many shared goals and objectives. Phase One of SCINET has been a "grassroots" effort to wire every public school in the State to support local and wide area networks, as well as the Internet, with the ultimate goal of making resources and technical skills available to each of our public school children. The next phase of the SCINET project will seek to provide telecommunications resources to libraries and health providers. provide such a focus. Effective technology planning recognizes that technology is only a tool that can be effectively ( or ineffectively) applied to public or private-sector applications to improve the quality of the goods, products, and services for the customer. The challenge is to use technology effectively.

In Conclusion

The SCIway Blueprint is a practical plan of action for increasing the number of South Carolinians who can access SCIway and the Internet and effectively utilize these resources. The Information Resources Council is anticipated to become a primary vehicle through which the plan's recommendations can be enacted.