How we could Digitally Transform Local Government in Sri Lanka

Have you ever passed a dangerous pothole on the road, that some hapless motorist might fall into at night? Seen a broken street lamp? Blundered through an overgrown wayside thicket? Worried about branches touching electrical wires? Noticed that your street corner is flooded after the rains? Been terrified of mosquitoes breeding in clogged drains? Noticed a hazard in a public building? Been concerned about precarious overhanging branches? Spotted a waterlogged wayside cliff that may slide? Observed a burst water pipe? Hindered by broken locks in public lavatories?

Or maybe you are being plagued by more chronic concerns. Like the lack of timely garbage collection, and a consequent explosion in the fly population. Or wanting to develop your dilapidated byroad, or needing a new street light in a dark corner, which is being used as a hangout by lowlifes.

We all frequently notice inconveniences or potential hazards in public places, but we often just don’t have a convenient, accurate and reliable mechanism to voice our concerns as soon as we notice them. So we simply stifle our concerns and move on.

I would like to share a neat solution idea that would allow citizens to inform the authorities and followup on public inconveniences or dangers, without inconveniencing themselves. It would enable citizens to speedily and accurately capture problems in the street, and present them factually to the responsible authority, within a framework of decisive action. It is a relatively simple solution that would digitally transform local government in Sri Lanka. The diagram below summarizes the concept.

There would be a Smartphone app, which all Sri Lanka citizens could download and use. This app would allow citizens to describe a particular concern textually, geo-tag the exact location where the problem exists, attach one or more photographs that demonstrates the problem clearly, and tag the area of concern (e.g. roads, garbage, traffic, lighting, bridges, sanitation, sewerage, security etc). The citizen would then be shown a shortlist of the likely responsible authorities, of which the citizen can elect one or more respondents, and submit the concern.

The citizen would now be able to see the status of their reported concern, and how the authorities have progressed towards a resolution.

All relevant authorities responsible for public concerns like Municipal Councils, Urban Development Authorities, The Electricity and Water Boards, the Police and suchlike would be allowed to subscribe to a Web dashboard of reported concerns, which is filtered to their sphere of interest. For example, the Municipal Commissioner of Kaduwela would see the concerns that are relevant to his authority and geographic area of operation. The authorities could judge for themselves the authenticity, gravity and urgency of a concern, prioritize it, and respond with a resolution plan.

The central government or patron-authority of this solution would be able to see a grand dashboard of all pending citizen’s concerns, complimented with visual analysis. They would be able to see the concerns flowing in as highlights on a map, see the local trends in concern generation and closure, and monitor the performance of local and regional authorities for expedient resolution of genuine and urgent problems.

The solution, which would serve as a digital pulse-check on local issues, could be extended further and made more engaging in a variety of ways. For example, one could leverage AI technologies to automatically tag the relevant area of concern and responsible authority, based on the geotag, description text and photographs. The relevant local authority could enter cost estimates for resolving each concern, which would help justify their annual budget. One could open the dashboard of concerns to the media and the general public, so that a certain amount of healthy pressure for solving problems comes naturally from the public itself, rather than from the administrative hierarchy alone.

The solution would be a disruptive innovation that transforms the mindset of the general public into a more civic-conscious one. It would in fact be an ecosystem for civic consciousness, which would challenge the mindset of those in authority, to find ways to serve the public faster.

Such a solution needs no complex legislative reforms to implement. If this solution were indeed implemented, our country could become an example to the rest of Asia, rising to the level of Scandinavian countries in terms of transparency and accountability for managing public infrastructure and services.

The key aspects of the holistic solution would be:

1. The Citizen’s app.
2. The Web Dashboard and underlying Cloud Database.
3. The publicity campaign to engage citizen involvement.
4. Monitoring and evaluation of efficiencies in addressing citizen concerns.
5. Continuous functional improvement of the software.

There is no rocket science involved in this solution, and it would be a “small” project in the grander scheme of things. It could be easily funded by spending a small fraction of the annual rates that are gathered from all households around the country. The return on investment for the state would be:

1. Clarity into the magnitude and distribution of citizen concerns.
2. Insight into the efficiency of local government.
3. Transparent empirical justification for local spending.

It would also be a significant public relations score, building citizen confidence through inclusive government, powered by information technology.