California’s CIO Takai: Collaboration via GIS

In an interview with eWeek, Takai explains how she plans to reorganize California’s IT infrastructure. She also lists her top five priorities, including collaboration, which she illustrates by explaining the plan for GIS. Amusingly, the interview took place at CeBIT 2009 in Hannover, Germany. Takai, Governor Schwarzenegger and 50 Silicon Valley companies were “feted” by Chancellor Angela Merkel and the German government.

California has been taking about naming a GIO for some time; perhaps it’s really imminent now?

3. “Collaboration. We need to be much more collaborative across state agencies, but it’s also our plan to reach out to the locals. For instance, we are just about to name a geographic information officer for all of our geographic information systems. The success of GIS is bringing in the information that the locals have as well as the information we have—which is particularly valuable for things like firefighting and the evacuation of personnel [in an emergency].”