COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

south dublin county council crest

MEETING OF SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

Monday, September 12, 2011

QUESTION NO. 20

QUESTION: Councillor G. O'Connell

Question

To compliment the Manager and staff on the   role allocated to South Dublin County Council by the Minister for the Envirioment in relation to the “Fixyourstreet” initiative and to ask for a report on the working of the pilot to date especially in relation to the response from the public in terms of participation and feedback.

REPLY:

he Fixyourstreet initiative was launched on 2nd August 2011 to enable citizens to report issues of a non emergency nature to Local Authorities. South Dublin County Council is the the pilot Local Authority for its operation, which is part of the current Programme for Government for National Recovery.  The following is an extract from the Programme with specific reference to the initiative:-

"Reforming Local Government    -       In local services, we will establish a website – www.fixmystreet.ie – to assist residents in reporting problems with street lighting, drainage, graffiti, waste collection and road and path maintenance in their neighbourhoods, with a guarantee that local officials will respond within two working days".

The pilot scheme is being very well received by the public since its introduction.  As at 5th September there have been 1323  reports and comments posted and 1264 responses issued under the relevant categories.   The primary commitment, to respond  to reports from residents within a two day timeframe is the most obvious challenge, and this deadline is being met.

The follow up, and the action required to resolve issues on the ground, is being integrated into our internal work programmes throughout all departments, in particular our Roads, Environment and Parks Departments.. As at 5th September 2011 109 commitments given under this system have been completed.   The site will continue to operate in the South Dublin County for the pilot period of 3 months but our colleagues in the Counties countrywide are very interested in getting involved.  

Fixyour street has been designed to cover three stages of development.   The first development is the facility to submit and respond to web queries. The second is the development of the smart phone application which should be in place by the end of the pilot period. This will give an additional functionality for customers to send a photo direct to the site and provide their Councils with photographic evidence of the scale of the problem being reported.  The third phase will be the use of QR codes: a type of matrix barcode (or two-dimensional code) designed to be read by smartphones which was designed to allow its contents to be decoded at high speed.

The concept of Fixyourstreet system has already been in operation within South Dublin County Council for a considerable period of time, with 23,132 webqueries being submitted and responded to as follows since 1st January 2010:

The Fixyourstreet initiative is expected to have a very positive impact on the delivery of our services and the resolution of the issues reported.  From the Councils perspective it provides us with tools to co-ordinate effective and efficient allocation of our resources and assists with monitoring areas with specific problems such as graffiti, illegal dumping, leaks and drainage problems, road conditions, trees and grass issues and  and street lighting.