The City of Lenexa Paperless Packet Project Report

Expectations are Met
The City of Lenexa's commitment to "use technology to work smarter" meant that to be successful in this endeavor, we would need to put forth the time and resources to achieve a higher level of functionality than ever before. We expected to do more work in less time and with no additional staff. We expected that the overall time saved by City staff and savings in supplies and equipment usage, in a relatively short period of time, would more than compensate the cost of acquiring the laptops for this project. We expect to continue to realize a cost savings in the future due to the implementation of this project. We have met our expectations!

The flow of communication between City Hall and Governing Body members is more convenient with everyone being "on line."Ê The use of electronic mail has become our primary means of communicating important and timely information between City staff and the Governing Body.

Staff time in the preparation of packet material has been reduced dramatically, it now takes only a few hours to prepare the electronic packet rather than a full day or more, and the staff member can work at their desk rather than stand at a copy machine.

With the electronic packets, the Governing Body members find their material more organized and, therefore, more easily accessible than with the volumes of paper they would have to keep and haul around with them. They no longer have to mess with a paper filing system. If they desire to retain one or all items of a packet from a particular meeting, it is easily stored on their laptop or a diskette.

Because Management Team members within the City have been provided with laptop computers, and because all City employees are connected to the network and have access to the electronic packet, means that the City has also gone paperless within our own organization.

Literally, reams of paper are saved by not having to make paper copies. As an interesting note, when the City was still producing paper packets statistics for the December 16, 1997 council meeting show that 16 paper packets were generated, plus three partial packets for three council members who had already gone paperless; the packet was 167 pages long supporting 25 items in the agenda; the number of copies made were 2,672 for the full packet and 48 for the partial packet. A total number of 2,720 copies or the equivalent of over five reams of paper were used to produce this packet. It took two days to produce and copy this packet, including overtime for the preparer to come in on Saturday to finish the copying.

The City has made significant accomplishments, but no other accomplishment has provided more benefit to the organization in its technological advancement than the Information Systems strategic plan. The strategic plan provides direction for the utilization of technology into the next century, assuring the organization that its investment in technology will provide great rewards for years to come.