New York launches ‘one stop shop’ for city services and benefits

New York has unveiled the first phase of the MyCity site, aiming to make it easier for residents to access information and support across agencies.

The site initially focuses on childcare subsidies and users can check eligibility, apply for, and track services and benefits in 10 languages, as well as save their information and documentation for future applications.

The second phase later this year will be geared towards job-seekers and small business owners, with more services to be incorporated over time.

“New Yorkers are busy 24/7 so today we are making it easier for New Yorkers to access city services – 24/7,” said Mayor Eric Adams. “The newly launched MyCity online portal will allow New Yorkers to go online, easily search, apply for, and track city services and benefits right from their smartphones or computers – and we’re starting by spotlighting childcare.

“For the first time, families who need help paying for childcare can apply in one place, with one application. We are using the power of technology to reduce the bureaucracy and red tape in our government, to help New Yorkers get the services their taxes pay for, and to ‘Get Stuff Done’ for the working people of this city.”

The launch is the result of collaboration between several departments and the city said it conducted months of user-testing before rolling out the service.

Built from scratch

The centralised MyCity service was one of Adams’ key policies when he ran for mayor. The application had been expected to launch by the end of 2022, which was Adams’ first year in office.

Adams said that he had been dealing with the pandemic as well as the influx of asylum seekers and that he wanted to ensure thorough testing was done ahead of launch. He said that the system had been built from scratch in around 15 months and the city had to get permission from the federal and state governments for some aspects of it.

MyCity aims to “rebuild city services from the ground up” to better meet residents’ needs. Internally, MyCity will act as a centralised data repository to enable more information-sharing across government agencies with the goal of achieving faster results for residents.

“New Yorkers deserve a better user experience when interacting with city government,” said Chief Technology Officer Matthew Fraser. “MyCity raises the bar for the way New York City delivers services and benefits.

“We are eager to see the impact this has on the lives of New Yorkers and to continue adding services to MyCity.”

Rationalising government

Fraser and Adams did not give a detailed schedule for future phases of MyCity.

“I think I want to just be very careful around timing,” Fraser said, adding that the focus would be on iterative deployment with priority given to high-impact services that are still analogue.

He continued: “We have a lot of digital forms today. Some of those things work, and they may not be the best, but at least there’s something. We’re not going to let the perfect be the enemy of the good. We’ll find the services that we can incorporate and bring them in.”

“We are working as fast and as quickly as we can,” he said.

In November, Fraser told Cities Today that “human-centric design” and “rationalising government” were key focuses for his team.

A growing number of cities are focusing on not only digitising services but also making them as user-friendly as possible.

A report published by Accenture in October, based on a survey in North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific, found that 39 percent of respondents wanted more digital interaction with their governments, up from 29 percent in 2019. However, 53 percent said that accessing public services is frustrating and only 36 percent find government processes and interactions intuitive.