Bromont, la Ville branchée Bromont, la Ville ... - Ville de Bromont

11 - A v r i l 2 0 0 4SPECIALREPO RT - BROMONT, THE CONNECTED COMMUNITYThe use of computersat the City of BromontBY ROBER T CLERMONT , WEBMASTERA MessageFrom the MayorDear citizens,In June 2001, the City of Bromont along with Bromont collectivitéingénieuse launched Bromont, ville branchée , a project that wouldoffer our residents as well as our corporate citizens new services andnew opportunities.Three years later, we can state with some pride that this technologicalturning point contributed to the quality of life of our citizens as wellas to the economic up-swing that we are experiencing and which ishighlighted by new investments in all sectors, residential commercialand industrial.To live in Bromont in this technological era means that our citizenshave at their disposal in addition to the more traditional personal ortelephone services, a vast array of municipal services available overthe internet from home from the office or from the various communityaccess locations which allow them to consult, seek informationor to effect transactions at any time of the day or night.In the field of economic and business development, we can safel ysay that access to high speed internet was a determining element inthe revitalisation of the business centre at 50 Gaspé in the establish -ment of Electest in the Pacifique street industrial park and in thearrival of numerous home-based workers and new residents. I wastold recently about a citizen who put his house up for sale (to moveto another house in Bromont) and was surprised at how quickly hefound a buyer – largely because the house which was situated in arural part of the city had access to high speed internet.The choice made by the city and supported by city staff to review itswork processes and invest in technology allows us to manage growthwith existing staff without compromising the quality of service.This strategic choice, made in June 2001 on behalf of the populationand ratified by the present Council contributes not only to ourquality of life but as well to our notoriety.In closing I would invite your comments and suggestions to help usto continue to improve our on-line services.High speed Internet and municipal computingComputing at the City of Bromont dates from the time when IB Mfirst established its factory in the industrial park. Ever since,a computing culture has evolved from the use of Selectric typewriters,to the taxation and building permit systems, payroll and,more recently, generalized emailing.Before the availability of cable-high speed Internet accessin 2001, data communications between City departments werelimited because of slow transmission throughputs using regularphone lines. The deployment of high speed Internet accessacross the territory, combined with the modernization of municipalcommunication and computing equipment has eased anddemocratised the use of email within City departments.The resulting benefits are multiple productivity gains mainlythrough greater documentation efficiency, less trips to City Hallfor delivering documents, reduced communication delays, newworkflow methods, etc.A few interesting factsOn a daily basis, the Bromont website (www.bromont.com)receives four to five hundred visitors who peruse an averageof four to five pages each for a total of fifteen hundred to twothousand web pages read everyday.Most popular sections of the Bromont website are those presen -ting tourism attractions and related topics such as accommodations,maps end events, followed by residential developments,municipal leisure and recreations programs, classifieds, localnews and the array of online services available such as theproperty assessment roll and graphic registe r, public notices andCity council minutes.The Bromont.com website presents more than 3000 pictures ofall size and formats within a couple of thousand web pagesas well as a dozen of programmes to manage online forms,classified ads section, post cards, sear ch engine, municipalbulletin emailing, discussion forum and quizzes for residentsfollowing courses at the Café Internet.More than 600 Bromonters have benefited from thefree introductory courses on to computing and the Internet325 children from La Chantignole elementary schoolhave received basics Internet training90% of residences on the territory can hook upto high speed Internet75% of Bromonters are daily users of the Internet.Pauline Quinlan, MayorTo be kept informed of municipal news, subscribeto the online newsletter under the «Registration»heading at www.bromont.com