Pittman and Friends Podcast
Welcome to Pittman and Friends, the curiously probing, sometimes awkward, but always revealing conversations between your host, Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman - that’s me - and whatever brave and willing public servant, community leader, or elected official I can find who has something to say that you should hear.
This podcast is provided as a public service of Anne Arundel County Government, so don’t expect me to get all partisan here. This is about the age-old art of government - of, by, and for the people.
Pittman and Friends Podcast
Jack Martin on Making Government Work Through IT
Unlock the secrets of government IT transformation with Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman and Information Technology Officer Jack Martin. Discover how IT innovations are revolutionizing government efficiency and service delivery, from transitioning paper-based processes to streamlined digital systems. Jack shares his inspiring 20-year journey, offering insights into the evolving role of IT in the government and the strategic importance of making technology accessible and understandable amidst budget challenges.
Experience the power of modern technology as we explore significant advancements in land use management and public safety. Learn about the transformative shift to electronic systems, enabling efficient zoning, inspections, and permit applications online. The creation of the Real-Time Information Center (RTIC) at the police department showcases how video feeds and data sources enhance resource management and public safety. We delve into the challenges and successes of implementing these cutting-edge systems, emphasizing their impact on accountability and transparency for both county employees and constituents.
Our conversation highlights the pivotal role of IT in supporting government operations and the professionals bridging the gap between technology and business. Discover how advanced technologies like body-worn cameras, GIS data, and CAD systems are integrated into emergency response strategies, while Paymentus simplifies bill payments for county residents. We reflect on the dedication required to secure funding, overcoming bureaucratic hurdles to improve county services, and the ongoing cycle of project completion and innovation that transforms the lives of residents and department heads alike.
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Welcome to Pittman and Friends. The curiously probing, sometimes awkward but always revealing conversations between your host, Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman that's me and whatever brave and willing public servant, community leader, or elected official I can find who has something to say that you should hear. This podcast is provided as a public service of Anne Arundel County, so don't expect me to get all partisan here. This is about the age-old art of government of, by and for the people. All right, well, I am Anne Arundel County Executive, Stuart Pittman, here with another of my friends. This is Jack Martin, who I would call the Director of Information Technology. But he just pointed out to me that he's the Information Technology Officer because it is an office unlike a department. But he can explain that if he wants.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:Your question may be why would I want to interview the guy who does all the IT work in the county? I mean, that's not the most exciting part of public policy in most people's minds, but there is a group of people out there who think this is the most exciting work that government does and I know Jack is among them. I hope he's among them because he's in it all day long and I am actually learning that. The importance of IT to what we do to serve our citizens cannot be overstated. And I also just like Jack. He's cool, everybody likes him. He's funny. I don't know Now I put him on the spot. He thinks he's going to have to be funny, but he's laughing right now. So let me start, Jack, and ask you, just give us, say hi, but go ahead and say hi first.
Jack Martin:Hi, I'm Jack Martin, Information Technology Officer.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:Information Technology Officer. All right, just tell us briefly what your department looks like, what your mission is, the structure, how many staff, that kind of thing.
Jack Martin:Sure. So we have about 120 people in Information Technology. We have about 90 merit positions and 30 contractors, and we are everywhere that our customers are. So we try to be in all the main buildings in the county serving where we need to be serving, and that's our mission. It's really to bring information technology services to all the departments that need it. We help the people who help the public, so that's what we do. We're a support agency and we realize it.
Jack Martin:I think during the 80s and 90s and even early 2000s, we had computers on most desktops and people were putting their information into their productivity systems, but they still ended up printing these things out. They printed it out and then they put it in a filing cabinet. Maybe they would put it in a folder and send it to another department for further processing. And it's only now where we're really changing the way business works by, instead of putting it into the computer and then printing it out, it's going into the computer and then it's staying in a system where it's further processed by another department or it's accessed by another department where we're exposing it in a report to the public. This is where we really change business. This is how we make things more efficient. We have the systems and the databases and the capabilities on the back end to process this. It's that's where information becomes a powerful force for government.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:Yeah, yeah, and we always say we're making government more efficient, we're doing things more efficiently with computers. And then you tell me you got 120 people doing it. But I won't be the curmudgeon from South County farm boy who complains about the fact that we got 120 people doing it. We're going to hear from you why we have 120 people doing it. We're going to hear from you why we have 120 people doing it in a minute and the extent of the work, because it really is impressive. But just first, you've been at this a while. How'd you end up in this job? What brought you here?
Jack Martin:So, yes, I've been with the county about 20 years, 19 years as the deputy CIO. So I've worked for all four previous CIOs. I've seen, you know and learned a lot from them. But when the job came open and I was asked to serve as acting, I did that and then I applied. I actually went through a regular application process and was appointed to the position and that was just how long ago, that was just a year, year and a half ago, Almost a year and a half ago.
Jack Martin:So yeah, I am fairly new in this position.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:There were four total, and you worked under all of them. What happened to all the four? There were four total and you worked under all of them. What happened?
Jack Martin:to all the four. So you know, the nature of this business is that there is some turnover.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:It was an impossible job maybe. I know, I'll just call up all the previous county executives and ask them what happened to the former IT officers. I think that's a great idea. No, so you know, when we lost the last one, I wondered, you know, who we could bring in that could take over all of these myriad projects that are going on. And when I found out there was this guy who'd been there for 19 years as the deputy, I thought, well, there must be some reason that he's stuck in that position all these years.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:It turned out that you were absolutely the person that everybody was hoping would take on this job at some point the people who worked under you and it's been a breath of fresh air for me because you explain things in ways that even I can understand and I know I don't understand them thoroughly, but enough to make the decisions that I have to make.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:And there seems to be a real positive attitude around there these days and things are moving forward. And usually when I meet with you or talk to you, it's because either something's changing in a big way that everybody has to know about some system, or something's costing a lot more money than you thought, and you come in with a huge budget request, but we always have a positive outcome. So I know there are a lot of different big projects that you have going on and you often have outside consultants. There's one that I've been really excited about since I took office. It's taken longer to implement than I had hoped. It's called the Land Use Navigator, the LUN. Tell us what it is and why it's taken so damn long to implement.
Jack Martin:So the Land Use Navigator is a really big project for us and we've been, I guess, involved with that for at least five years now. But we have had some really big successes with that and they've already shown us that we're on the right path and that it's very meaningful. So one of the ways that we can measure success is by looking at did we make a process more efficient internally?
County Executive Steuart Pittman:Let me back up to where we were, which is applications to Planning and Zoning and Inspections and Permits to do anything on the land, right. Whether it's a grading permit or subdivision or an addition of your porch was done with paper, right? Right, and often people were trying to do research to look up activities in the past. When the planners, the long-range planners, were trying to look at the future and our Stakeholder Advisory Committees and the Region Plans, it was really hard to put data together. When this Council was trying to do legislation it was really hard. We couldn't go to Plannig and Zoning and say, "can you pull this data about what's been done in different parts of the County", because it was all in files and it was slow. So I know other counties had electronic systems for applications. Is that where we're going everywhere?
Jack Martin:It is and it's really important. It's to get the interfaces, the user interfaces, directly into our constituents' hands so they can fill out the form. They know the most about what it is that they're wanting to do. They just don't necessarily know all the rules that we're using, for you know whether it's, you know, some sort of permit, but I think that one of the main things that this system brings is it gets all of our land use departments into one system so they can view all the data. They have, as you mentioned, access to all the historical data, and one of the main benefits of this is that the citizens have access to the status of their permit, so they don't have to call and wait on hold for somebody to you know, for them to ask about their permit, have it be looked up. You know this is one of the benefits of these newer, modern systems is that they have direct access to the status of their permit. Another thing is….
County Executive Steuart Pittman:I will point out that not only do they have access to all of it, but major parts of it the neighbors have access to, and often neighbors want to know what's going on when they see the bulldozers show up or they see that sign go up saying there's going to be a hearing about, and so there's an amazing amount of information available just to community groups and residents now.
Jack Martin:Absolutely. People want to know because they're invested as well, right. I mean, they're invested in where they live, so it's important to them and we understand that, and so that's one of the benefits. I think one of the other benefits is time. So we want to get people some of their time back and we've seen that in the licensing area from this same system in allowing people like a HVAC contractor, they don't have to do their license renewals in person anymore. They can do all that online. Save that time. So if it's a couple hours that they're saving there, they don't have to drive in, get their license renewal, or even their initial licensing. So there's time savings that we're talking about access and transparency and moving all the permit review and markup online. We'll get a really smooth workflow across our departments and have exchange of information and versioning back and forth with the permit applicants directly into the department so they can know exactly when there's a comment. They'll have that comment on that. You know. Aspect of the plan.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:And everybody can look at it.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:Yes, and I know you know contractors it was a mixed bag as we were implementing it, especially at Inspections and Permits, because it was new and people were figuring out how to use it, both staff and people on the outside.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:But one of the things that I kept saying and I don't know whether it's worked this way or not, but for those who think that the county employees don't work efficiently, that somebody lost their something, that they're being mistreated, the dates and the information are all there for everybody to see. So I believe it holds the employees accountable to timelines, because everybody can look at when things were requested and when things went in and the progress and now we're getting data as Inspections and Permits is finally getting to the point where they're fully staffed. They've had a staffing issue and they've got this new system underway where we're starting to get calls congratulating us and thanking us for the efficiency of the work at Inspections and Permits, and that's that's really rewarding, coming from a place where I rarely got those calls before. They're probably one of the the most complained about departments, because when you're building something, time is money.
Jack Martin:It absolutely is, and fairly or unfairly, there's just an aspect of a lack of information. You know what fills the void, question marks, you know, or worse. So people want to know what the status of their permit or their review or their inspection. They want to know what that is and this system can give them basically instant access to that status, and that is a real relief. There's no lost request or anything like that. It's all like you pointed out. It's all out there for everyone to see.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:Let's jump to public safety, because I know you have a lot of projects that you've been doing with dispatchers and radios and all of that. And the one really the sexy one right now is the RTIC, the Real-Time Information Center over at the Police Department, that you've been putting together. Tell us what that is.
Jack Martin:So we are playing a small role with the RTIC project. The RTIC project is a fantastic example of a department having a long-range vision for what they want to do and what they need to do it, and that is for the Police Department. They know that they're going to manage their force, their forces, their people, with information. And the way to do that, they need to gather that information, and so that's where the real-time information center comes in. They're gonna bring in these information sources and they're gonna view and manage them in this, when you say information.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:That includes video feeds from businesses that have cameras, that have connected and have agreed to connect, right? Correct all kinds of video. Body-worn camera video from officers.
Jack Martin:Yes, all kinds of video sources, including both of those as well as probably other video sources. They could have, you know, an aerial vehicle in the future. It could be from their helicopter. It could be many, many sources. Plus our mapping data resources right. Our rich GIS data and CAD information from the 9-1-1 CAD system will be in there as well.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:So yeah, I've heard they're getting their from the school system. They're getting the the floor plans of the schools. So if there were a school shooter or an incident in a school, they would. There would be somebody sitting in the real-time information center looking at a screen right and and they would have video feeds of active crime sites and buildings that are involved in those crime sites and body-worn camera information and they would be getting that information back to the officers in real time, right? Absolutely, almost like something you'd see in a movie.
Jack Martin:I think that's the futuristic vision for that. I think we don't even know all the different ways that this can be used, but I think the important, the important thing that I take away from this is that they know they're going to improve their outcomes for the public by using more information, and I couldn't agree with that more. I think that that has the best possible of all possible chances of succeeding, and so we're right there helping them out. We're supporting the you know, support of the design and build out of that room, and I think it's very exciting as they go forward and looking at agreements with, you know, private sector businesses that have video feeds and things like that. Anything that can help them with their project, we also help out with. We support the 911 call center.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:We support there was a big which is being put together, a new project integrating police and fire. You know, probably one of the last counties in the state to do so, but we're gonna have the best when it's done right.
Jack Martin:Absolutely, and better late than never. I think there's a ton of potential there. In addition to that, we are working on bringing a new CAD system to the county. So that is a big project for us, helping out police and fire, find the right fit, find the right system to bring in. And then we support the new radio system. So there's a new radio system that's tightly integrated with the 911 call center.
Jack Martin:Yeah, those really expensive Motorola radios and the towers and the whole system, yeah. You know it's all about making sure that our public safety employees have all the tools they need to support the public, right. So if they know that, no matter where they are, they can push a button and call their team members, right, if they get in a bind, then they're going to go all out supporting the public as much as they can because they know they've got backup. And that's what we wanted to bring with that system. We did bring best system possible to bear and that was designed. That was. That was, I think, a seven year project, six or seven year project and that's just wrapping up now. Uh, very successful. And we increased the number, we doubled the number of towers, uh, basically. So we you know we've got tower shelters and you know the servers we've got. We, we've got every necessary element to make sure that it's not just a tower network, it's everything that goes along with it to support the communication infrastructure.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:That's public safety. Tell me what is Paymentus.
Jack Martin:Paymentus is a great tool for us. It's basically a single source where we can bring all of our applications that a constituent or citizen may utilize to pay a bill for the county. This one portal has the ability to bring any of them in and allow a citizen to have one way to pay a county bill, which is really nice. We haven't finished that project.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:So they don't have to come into the Arundel Center with their handwritten check or their cash money anymore?
Jack Martin:They don't have to, they still can, and some people prefer that. But we haven't finished integrating this Paymentus. They don't have to, they still can, and some people prefer that. But we have finished integrating this payment is with all of our systems, but that is the goal to make it as simple as possible. We have one way to pay I and it'll work with every system we have, and so that's one of the main ways that we selected.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:It was it had the most potential to integrate with all of our other systems. So the big centralized system with all of the county's finances in it. Is it true that it's on mainframe computers and it was put together 25 years ago?
Jack Martin:That is correct.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:And it's still operating that is correct.
Jack Martin:It is operating, it is still functional and it's technically fine, but we do need to replace it. There's a couple reasons, besides the fact that it's very, very old, and that is that nobody knows how to work it anymore. You know what? They are not being taught how to work with those systems anymore in school, so that is a real reason to actually upgrade it. But for our users, just to have a more modern interface with more workflows and better reporting. It'll enable us to work more efficiently here in-house with our financial system, just bringing something that has a lot more modern interface and capabilities to it. It'll also have all the cloud capabilities and very tight integration with all of the interfaces. So it's a big project for us, but it's one that we've known was coming and we look forward to succeeding and just a taste of how these things work in government.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:I have to note that last week we had a cabinet meeting with all the department heads and Jack came in and did a presentation about this new system that was going to be coming, knowing that everybody in the room had a group of employees under them who were used to the old system and change is hard. They've learned how to use the old system and change is hard. They've learned how to use the old system and you gave a very inspiring pitch for how this was going to ultimately make life easier, even though there would be a period of change. And I've got to say that I know that we lose staff over these changes, that folks have been here for 15, 20, 25 years. They don't want to learn something new. I know at Inspections and Permits, the inspectors who had been doing things one way didn't want to change to iPads and all of this, and we lost some of them.
Jack Martin:Look, change can be hard. Change is hard. I mean, look at getting a new car or even a new cell phone. Sometimes you just don't feel like dealing with it. I know years ago I used to buy the same brand cell phone again and again. So I didn't, I could just move everything over to the new one. I didn't have to change. Change can be hard. So I understand that I wouldn't retire over it, but I do understand the sentiment and I think that it's important for us to embrace the potential of the new system and understand there will be short-term pain and long-term gain for everyone.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:Yeah, and an old curmudgeon like me. I see these budget requests and what it costs to make the change and there's always consultants involved and vendors that we all know are just trying to make money. But y'all are careful about that. I know you pinch the pennies where you can and get the best deal that you can.
Jack Martin:We absolutely do. Managing money very carefully, because it's not our money, is very important to us that we take that very seriously.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:Yeah, I think there was a candidate for my job who put up signs all over the county saying because it's your money. He was absolutely right. Wasn't enough to get him elected, though. Hopefully because we are paying attention to the money.
Jack Martin:We are.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:I cannot end an interview with an IT guy without asking the question that everybody always asks so what about AI? Is there going to be a time when we don't need to have a County Executive and AI, the machine, will run the whole thing for us? What are we doing with AI in government?
Jack Martin:So AI is a great topic in IT and I'm actually really glad that it's come up recently, not necessarily with its failures, but I'm glad it's making people think. So AI capabilities are built into a lot of software that we use every day and already have been using for some number of years, like your spell checker or something like that, and whether it's Word or in Google Docs. But, uh, these capabilities are there, they've been there, it's just that, uh, and there's nothing too scary about them.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:I think, uh, it's scary when it tries to tell me that it thinks what I know I was going to write and then it finishes it for me and it has a totally different meaning. Scary in a good way or a bad way. Well, funny sometimes.
Jack Martin:Absolutely. I think LLM, or large language model AI, is a new type of AI, so that's a new spin on it. At this point it's a very immature technology and so it's going out and it's kind of getting information from untrained databases. So we don't know or control where it's getting its information from and that's the scary part. So AI itself has been around a long time and really isn't that scary, but this new version, where the vendors are kind of using us to beta test what they've built, it's new and interesting and you do need to be cautious how it's used and we are being very careful with AI here in the county.
Jack Martin:We've set up policies. We've asked, required everyone who wants to use it in the county to register with us and tell us how they're using it, and we're making sure that they agree to our policies not to put anything confidential in there and certainly not to use it for anything that's HIPAA protected or PII type of information. So other than that, I think it can be helpful. You know, helping you formulate a letter, or you know a couple paragraphs on a topic. You know we did a survey a couple months ago and I asked it to help me formulate 10 questions on customer service and they were actually very, very good.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:So for some things it can be helpful If you don't want to feed it things that you don't want to be utilized out in the public and you mentioned to me a week or two ago, and then in the newspaper and an interviewer on this very topic, when they were asking local IT folks about AI, that you have had some testing that has failed and you have backed off on it like for permitting. You were hoping that AI would be able to help people get through the maze and all the questions that you ask in a permitting process, but that it wasn't really giving the right answers.
Jack Martin:Yes, yes, we've done two sizable projects testing AI. One was a huge success and one, as you mentioned, was not a complete success, and that was helping people get better information about the permitting process. And that is going back to the data that's training these things. It's not magic, right. It's data that's feeding the system on the back end, and so it didn't have enough data to feed it so it would give the correct answers and we're working with Inspections and Permits. We expect to have another version of that in the near future, where it will be successful. In another project where we used AI to look at incoming requests from constituents, it was actually very successful at summarizing the request and giving kind of a sentiment reading of that request, so that the person who was reviewing and prioritizing requests could quickly and easily do that.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:So there was still a person involved that wasn't actually giving the answer to the.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:No, that's correct, Absolutely we have people involved, good, yeah, well. So last thing I want to ask about, because this is something. Well, I like to ask anybody who's a manager of a lot of people. You're a manager of a lot of people and a lot of projects. That can be really frustrating and hard, and maybe that's why we change IT officers every few years, but people like you and the morale over there seems great. I've been to some of your parties and eaten cake and pizza with you. What's your secret to managing a team like this?
Jack Martin:Well, I'll tell you what I think. Opinions on that can vary, but I think it all goes back to the team. We have a fantastic team of professionals in IT. They're very knowledgeable and they're dedicated to the mission.
Jack Martin:When you have that, you can do literally anything. Basically go-getters you need to set them up for success and let them go. So basically, get them the resources that they need to do their jobs and then clear any problems. So you want to make sure that there's no issues procuring anything that they need, that they have the funding that they need to do their job, that there's any policies they need in place or modifying policies. You need to make sure that they can just go do their job and they're doing it because they're very dedicated to the mission serving all of our departments. They know the technology side of it. They learn enough about the business side. They're certainly not pros at the business side, like, say, in Public Works or, you know, in public safety, but they learn enough to be supportive of the projects that we're involved in. Uh, and they they go help out all the time where they're all you know, all the time yeah they are very, very helpful.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:I know I go to Janine, Janine goes to your folks, uh, and then they tell us how to work our stuff. It's usually not broken, it's because we haven't figured out how to work stuff. But great. Well, you have really hit the ground running in the last year. You've convinced the County Council that you know you've got everything under control and we've all said yes to all of your requests. I know you do the dirty work for them so that they have the funding and, you know, get through all the bureaucracy of government and don't have to worry about that. And you do so. Thank you for your service and hopefully, by the time at least, I'm out of here, a lot of these projects will be wrapped up, won't they?
Jack Martin:Yes, they will.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:And they'll still be the others that are still going on.
Jack Martin:There will be new projects in their place. But, yes, most of the projects we're talking about today are going to be wrapped up by then.
County Executive Steuart Pittman:Good, Well, I know that, on behalf of every department head in the county, thank you for what you do to make all of their lives easier, and that absolutely trickles down to every one of our residents. So thank you.
Jack Martin:I appreciate the opportunity to talk about this today with you. Thank you.
