Katya Kirilova
Opportunity to Assess the Economic Efficiency of Investment in Information Technology in Local Governments
Summary:
Bulgaria is in the development stage, where significant investments are needed in order to create and use appropriate electronic government. Part of the idea of building an e-government is related to the scope of services that municipalities provide. For these reasons it is important from a theoretical and practical standpoint to clarify whether the factors for creating functional e-local government are properly defined. For this purpose, in the paper we use a survey for the level of information systems and technologies in municipalities and on that basis we determine some opportunities for building online services in local administrations. Some characteristics are considered in the development of information systems for the needs of the local administration. We present the processes of awareness of the information need, definition of information problem, definition of the purpose and scope of the system, development of task specification, evaluation of economic efficiency, and implementation of the system. On this basis, the possibilities are derived to assess the economic efficiency of investments in information technologies and software in the municipal administration. Finally, conclusions are formulated.
