Palo Alto 101 Profiles

Who’s in Charge in Palo Alto? Pulse Q&A with CIO Jonathan Reichental

City of Palo Alto CIO Jonathan Reichental

Who are the people in Palo Alto city government and why do give their time and talent to making this such a great place to live? Palo Alto Pulse sat down recently to explore this question with Jonathan Reichental, the city’s Chief Information Officer (CIO).

Palo Alto Pulse: What is the Role of Chief Information Officer? What exactly do you do?

Jonathan Reichental: The CIO reports to the City Manager (Jim Keene) and is a cabinet-level position. The CIO role was only created three and half years ago, and I am the first person who was hired for it. This job used to be structured differently and was called information technology services manager, but the City wanted to elevate the importance of technology and better match the structure of the private sector companies, which often have a CIO role.

I have 32 people who report to me and we are in charge of all digital technology for the City of Palo Alto. We oversee the functioning of 300 digital systems that run both our internal government operations, such as utilities and public works and the ones that residents use to do things like pay bills, buy tickets for the Children’s Theater, etc. We also manage the implementation of all new digital systems, along with regular upgrades and maintenance.

What is your background? What made you want to work for the City of Palo Alto?

JR: I am a private sector person and this is my first job working in government. I have a Ph.D. in computer science and an undergraduate and degree in engineering. I am a native of Ireland and spent the first 15 years of my career working at Price Waterhouse Coopers in New York, working my way up to head of technology innovation for the company.  I wanted to get closer to the tech revolution on the west coast so I left PwC to work as the CIO of O’Reilly Media, a technology publishing company based in San Francisco.

I was happily employed by O’Reilly Media when a recruiter called me about the CIO role for the City of Palo Alto. Although it felt like a big risk to leave the private sector, I was interested in the idea of doing social good and being part of Palo Alto so I decided to make the transition. I find it rewarding to be in public service because it’s so different from client-based work. In this role, everyone in the city is your customer, and that makes it challenging and fun.

How has your background influenced your approach to the CIO role in Palo Alto?

JR: When I came here in 2011, the bar was pretty low for what was then the “IT” department. There were no established processes for prioritizing technology projects and things moved very slowly. Having worked in the private sector, I’m used to moving quickly and I brought this impatience to help improve the department. The first thing we did was establish a process for information technology governance so we could make strategic decisions about which projects to do, how to do them and how to evaluate their delivery.

This sounds simple but it has had a huge impact on the efficiency of the department and how we do business. We estimated recently that we’ve saved the City of Palo Alto over $1 million by eliminating duplication, canceling unnecessary projects and better defining the scope of different efforts.

Can you give us a few examples of projects that your office has executed?

JR: On the internal side, we are working right now to implement a new, cloud-based email system that will be used by all city employees. It won’t impact the residents of Palo Alto directly, but indirectly it will greatly improve the efficiency of communication and ultimately speed up response time on areas such paying bills, reserving fields, etc. Palo_Alto_311_Banner_Higher_Res_3

On the external side, we’ve launched an app called Palo Alto 311 that is available now but residents will start hearing about it more in 2015. With Palo Alto 311, residents can engage with city government in a variety of exciting ways through their mobile devices. For example, people can snap a photo of a broken street sign or pothole, send it through Palo Alto 311 and city employees will respond when the repairs have been made. In addition, residents will be able to search the Palo Alto library catalogue, pay their utility bills or report a power outage. I call it ‘government in a box.’

How do you connect with the local tech experts all around Palo Alto who could contribute ideas and resources?

JR: People come into my office all the time to offer ideas and we are so lucky to have these resources at our doorstep. But we also actively reach out to engage experts where needed.

For example, we are exploring how to implement city-wide fiber in Palo Alto so that every home and office is connected to high speed Internet access. We formed a Citizen’s Advisory Committee made up of nine Palo Alto residents who could advise us on this process: Richard Brand, Leona Cook, David Creemer, Bob Harrington, Brad Horak, Andrew Kau, Donald (Donn) Lee, Christine Moe, and Andy Poggio. At our first meeting, I looked around the room and realized that almost everyone there was instrumental in some part of forming or growing the Internet. It’s amazing the expertise we have here in Palo Alto and how many people want to help. This committee will report its findings and recommendations in 2015.

What’s on your dream list for technology projects in Palo Alto?

JR: I’m lucky because I have the resources I need in terms of people and time to pursue the priorities that are most important in Palo Alto. But there are still too many processes that are paper-driven. I’d like to get rid of the forms and move more of this onto mobile devices to improve efficiency. Many departments in the City of Palo Alto have huge file cabinets to store all the paperwork- I envision a future where none of these are needed.

What else do you want the residents of Palo Alto to know about you and the office of CIO?

JR: My team is passionate about doing the right thing for the residents and taxpayers of Palo Alto. We are focused on the future and on using technology to help build a great community. I am constantly looking at best practices from the private sector to see how we can bring them into the City of Palo Alto operations to improve how we do business. People in other cities see what we are doing and they want to learn from us (note from Palo Alto Pulse: Jonathan was honored by govtech.com as a ‘Top 25 doer, dreamer and driver in public sector innovation’ in 2013).

Cogswell Plaza has free wifi provided by the City of Palo Alto

Cogswell Plaza has free wifi provided by the City of Palo Alto

It’s a privilege to be in this role and I find it enormously satisfying to make things work for the people of Palo Alto. Every time I drive by Cogswell Plaza and see people working on laptops, I feel happy that I helped make it possible to put free wifi there for everyone to enjoy.

 

Jonathan Reichental welcomes comments and suggestions from Palo Altans about how technology can be used to improve city government. He can be reached at OfficeOfTheCIO@CityofPaloAlto.org or by phone at 650-329-2182. Tweet to @PaloAltoCIO.

About the author

Victoria Thorp

Victoria Thorp

Victoria is the founder and editor of Palo Alto Pulse and has lived in Palo Alto since 2007. Victoria's diverse professional background includes working as the editor of GreatSchools.org , as a senior writer for KIPP and Teach for America, and as a radio producer for City Visions on KALW (91.7FM San Francisco). She is a graduate of Leadership Palo Alto and a member of the Palo Alto Partners in Education Advisory Board.

She has a BA in English from Tufts University and Masters in Education and Secondary Teaching Credential in English from UCLA.

2 Comments

  • It was interesting to learn more about J. Reichental’s vision for technology in Palo Alto. We are fortunate to have him.

  • Bring on the city-wide fiber to the home, and while you are at it, let’s bring internet services under the umbrella of City utilities!

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