Photograph by George Sakkestad
David McKay is happy to see this graph of 1996-97 town expenditures online, but he thinks the town could post a lot more documents online.
By Clarence Cromwell
David McKay, a Los Gatos resident and retired IBM software programmer, wants the town to let citizens access its files online.
Los Gatos officials said it looks like a good idea, but the town doesn't yet have the time and money required to make this possible. They added that the town's online offerings--a web page and a local bulletin board--are pretty good, compared to other municipalities.
Nevertheless, most important town documents are unavailable online.
"We just don't have time to play games with it. We're busy," Town Clerk Marian Cosgrove said.
Citizens are entitled to copies of almost all town documents under California's public records act, but anyone who wants them must go to the Town Clerk's office to pick them up and may have to pay photocopying fees, depending on the document. With the exception of agendas and minutes to public meetings, none of the town's public documents can be obtained online.
In a letter dated July 1, McKay asked the Town Council to post notices of public meetings, the town budget and any other documents stored in computers on an Internet site. That would let computer-conscious Los Gatans like McKay dial up Town Hall and read town documents from their homes.
McKay said the town should offer information online with at least the same speed it must deliver up paper documents. State law requires that agendas for public meetings be available 72 hours in advance. He also said that town documents should be stored in computers and stored in a format that will allow residents to access them. He suggested public computer terminals at the library to allow those without computers to access information electronically.
McKay is a member of Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility, a group of computer enthusiasts whose roots lie in its opposition to designing nuclear weapons with computers. Now the organization focuses on social issues such as privacy rights on the Internet and universal access to computers.
McKay said he feels limited by the amount of computer information available from local governments.
McKay prefers online information to sheafs of paper, because the computer can help him process it, with key-word searches or other computing tricks.
"Sometimes my computer is faster than my mind," McKay said.
Town Clerk Marian Cosgrove said online data may be handy to some people, but Los Gatos lacks the resources to fulfill McKay's request.
"That's a great idea if someone will pay for the [computer memory] space," Cosgrove said.
Cosgrove said the town computer system is already overtaxed by some jobs--the finance and planning departments have to schedule their biggest computing jobs so they don't happen at the same time. She believes the town would need new computers to offer information online.
New equipment is unlikely, because the town's coffers are so low that the council recently eliminated three jobs from the town budget.
Time limits the amount of information posted online as well. Cosgrove said the clerk's office already handles about as much work as it can. But if volunteers want to help the town by adding to its online offerings, their work would be appreciated, she said.
Cosgrove added that she doesn't want to undergo any further training to learn how to post information online or store it on computers.
She added, "Sure, it'd be nice for you to access that on the Internet, but it takes 10 minutes to come down here, get it, and go back, and then you have it in your hand."
Residents currently have to pick up most documents with their hands.
The town has a copy of the budget and the Town Code on its computer, Cosgrove said. Only town employees can look at the digital versions, she said, but the library has copies of both the budget and the Town Code in the reference section. Or anyone who wants the documents can pay $15 for a copy of the budget and $150 for the 2,963-page Town Code.
The clerk suggested to McKay that he draft a policy for the town that would explain what information should be posted online, how it would get there and how much the endeavor would cost.
Town Manager Dave Knapp agreed that posting more information online would take a lot of time and money, but he'd support the idea if McKay could figure out where to get the money and if more people asked for information online.
"We put a great deal of information online now. More than most communities," Knapp said.
Residents may want more information through their computers in the future, but the town still has to be realistic about what it can afford to do right now, said Councilmember Joanne Benjamin, who spearheaded the effort to open the town's Web page and post information on an electronic bulletin board.
"The more you can put out there, the better, but the question comes down to who's going to do it," Benjamin said.
Benjamin and Knapp said no one is sure how many people want to look at town documents on their computers.
The town currently posts Town Council agendas on its Web page, and both agendas and minutes are available on Virtual Valley Community Network, an online service owned by Metro Publishing Inc., parent company of the Los Gatos Weekly-Times. The town Web page even allows users to apply for a building permit online.
This article appeared in the Los Gatos Weekly-Times, August 7, 1996.
©1996 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved