In a broader context of the electronisation of public administration, the services of local government and the services of state administration will be an equal part of e-government. On the side of municipal offices, a major improvement in the arrangement and use of ICT can be expected. The resolution of these tasks by individual investments into ICT is unfeasible both in terms of finance and time demands, especially in smaller municipalities. A more suitable model is a central solution that enables municipal offices to share software applications for internal administration and the provision of services to citizens.
The aim of the project is to create a set of software solutions for improving the work efficiency of municipal offices and to make local government electronic services accessible to citizens. These solutions will be provided to local governments using the specialised Data centre of towns and villages in the form of “software as a service” (SaaS). This lets workers of municipal offices use software applications without the need to install specialised software. The DCOM information system will gradually be integrated with the modules of the Central Public Administration Portal (ÚPVS), central registers and overall with the e-government environment.
The DCOM project includes the supply of necessary IT equipment for municipal offices and follow-up maintenance and care. Municipalities will therefore have a comprehensive set of services available that covers their needs and frees them substantially from the need to look after IT sources.
The DCOM solution will be available for all segments of towns and villages. An economic analysis shows that the proposed solution will be of most interest for the segment of municipalities with 500 to 5 000 inhabitants. Based on a conservative estimate, the DCOM services will be used by roughly one thousand municipalities within the space of 5 years.