Brown University Report

Delaware and Michigan Are Best States for American e-Government. Virginia.gov moves up from 35th to 29th (whee. We suck).

Web sites are evaluated for the presence of various electronic features, such as online publications, databases, audio clips, video clips, foreign language content, translation services, advertisements, premium fees, user payments or fees, disability access, privacy policy, security policy, online services, digital signatures, credit card payments, e-mail addresses, comment forms, automatic e-mail updates, Web site personalization, PDA accessibility, and readability level.

Citizens are being asked to shoulder more of the cost of providing online services, the survey found. Seventeen percent of sites charge visitors a fee to use online services, up from 12 percent last year. In terms of online services, 86 percent of state and federal sites have services that are fully executable online, up from 77 percent last year. In addition, a growing number of sites offer privacy and security policy statements. This year, 73 percent have some form of privacy policy on their site, up from 71 percent in 2006. Fifty-two percent now have a visible security policy, down from 63 percent last year. Twenty-two percent of sites offer some type of foreign language translation.

In terms of disability access for the visually impaired, automated Bobby software, available from Watchfire, Inc., found that 54 percent of federal sites and 46 percent of state sites meet the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) disability guidelines. The federal numbers are the same as last year, while the state numbers are up from 43 percent.

The study also ranks the 50 states and various federal agencies on overall e-government performance. Using measures such as online services, attention to privacy and security, disability access, and foreign language translation, researchers rated the various state sites and compared their performance to last year.

The top ranking states include Delaware, Michigan, Maine, Kentucky, Tennessee, Massachusetts, Maryland, Texas, New Jersey, and Utah. The following table shows where each state ranked in 2006, with the previous year’s ranking and score in parentheses.

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