North Castle to Create Tech Task Force to Improve Communications
The North Castle Town Board is likely to form a technology task force that will explore ways for officials to more effectively engage residents, respond to misinformation and bolster protection from cybersecurity threats.
Councilman Saleem Hussain, who works at IBM in Armonk, sparked the initiative among his board colleagues to create a five-member committee that would also look how the town uses technology as a communication channel and how it would measure success in the way it uses tech across town operations.
“We should also be clear that this task force is not about building something from scratch,” Hussain said. “We’re using technology already and in many cutting-edge ways across the town. The website is a great example. We have so much information on the website, we need to be incrementing what we have and not thinking we’re building.”
Despite all that information that’s available at the public’s fingertips, there are still many residents who are unaware that some of their questions and concerns can be answered by using it more extensively, said Councilwoman Barbara DiGiacinto. Sending out short video to residents to remind them what can be found on the site could be highly valuable, she suggested.
Hussain mentioned that even if efforts entail making access to information easier, that’s a meaningful goal.
Supervisor Michael Schiliro said the board intends to have a public hearing on the matter at its lone meeting next month on Dec. 8 and hopefully create the task force and populate it the start of next year.
“The idea is to have an IT technology task force to study all things that we do in town, to improve upon what we currently do and I think it’s a real good initiative that Saleem’s bringing to us,” he said.
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