Enacting the Government-Wide New York State Website

Abstract

While the state of New York is one of the largest and most populous in the US, it was the last major state to create a centralized IT agency (around 1997), following decades of almost complete decentralization of IT functions and services. The New York State (NYS) website demonstrates how a large and diverse state government with a long history of decentralized IT management goes about creating a high-quality government-wide website. In addition to other state governments, the lessons from this case are potentially useful for government agencies at all levels (national, regional, and local) in many developed and developing countries around the world.