The City of Greenville is testing another way to communicate with its citizens.  The City is rolling out a trial run of the social networking site Twitter.

Twitter is a free service that allows people to communicate via short (maximum 140 characters) messages (tweets). Users can get these messages on their Twitter webpage, on their computer desktop, or via SMS text messages to mobile devices like cell phones.

“We think the service will be a very convenient way to communicate with our citizens,” said Steve Hawley, Communications Manager / Public Information Officer. “There is already a segment of our population who are using the service and even a group of people dedicated to Tweeting here in Greenville. It seemed natural to tap into this low cost communications tool to give them information about their government.”

The City will begin with three accounts: one is for general information such as city news, meeting reminders, program announcements and such. The second is for urgent or emergency alerts such as closures, cancellations, and evacuations. “Some cellular providers charge for incoming text messages,” said Hawley, “and the alert feed gives us a way to get more important information out to people who don’t want to have to pay for or receive lots of messages. These will be limited in number to the most important messages so that they can reach you when you’re not at your computer.”

The third is for alerts for the GREAT bus system, mostly to alert customers when a bus they’re waiting for is delayed 10 minutes or longer. Transit Manager Nancy Harrington said, “If Twitter works the way we hope it will, then this will be a valuable extension of our GREAT customer service.” GREAT tweets are slated to begin June 22nd.
The trial run is expected to last three months. If evaluation results are positive, the City plans to roll out a Twitter account for Recreation and Parks. They are exploring using the service for important event announcements, cancellations, and other urgent changes – similar to the City and GREAT alerts.

Other governments are using Web 2.0 tools like Twitter and Facebook to better communicate with their citizens. Members of the Public Information Office recently went to a conference of city and county communicators in Hickory and found that several North Carolina cities, towns, and counties are already using this service with very positive feedback. Recently, the White House directed all Executive Branch agencies of the Federal government to utilize Web 2.0 tools.

To sign up for the free service, go to www.twitter.com/GNC_CityInfo for the City’s main Twitter feed and www.twitter.com/GNC_CityAlerts for the feed of urgent or emergency information.

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