Community Resident Information Services (CRiS)

1994

During the Fall of 1994, the newly formed Department of Information Technology (DIT) began an Information Technology planning process for Fiscal Year 1996. At the completion of this process, five County agencies had submitted six requests for the development and implementation of a multimedia kiosk.

1995

In February 1995, the County's Chief Information Officer requested that DIT staff begin the process of investigating the kiosk requests. One of the top priorities was the development of multimedia kiosks. The Chairman requested two kiosks to be operational in separate Fairfax County Public Library (FCPL) libraries at opposite sides of the County, with a variety of information types, by September 1995. The plan also chose Libraries as the place to introduce the kiosk as well as participate in recommending information content, format presentation, and information organization.

By late February, 1995, the team, which included members from Libraries, Community and Recreation Services, the Fairfax-Falls Church Community Services Board, Purchasing and Supply Management, Office of Public Affairs, as well as DIT, was assembled to identify the information content, draft a Request for Proposal for procuring two kiosk workstations, identify the locations for each kiosk, and identify the functions, requirements and transactions which would be presented. They met frequently, mindful of the very short deadline facing them.

1996

During the initial pilot stage, a motion from the Board of Supervisors expanded the scope of the pilot to request additional kiosks for each Supervisor's district office, by September 1996. This was primarily due to the satellite Tax offices being closed at the district supervisor's offices. Later, library branch locations were shown to be better-used sites, and most supervisors had their kiosks transferred to library branches except the Mason District Governmental Center.

In September, 1996, the full complements of 8 pilot kiosks were deployed in the County. They were named CRiS, County Resident Information Services. (Although the name CRiS remained, this acronym came to stand for Community Resident Information Services as other jurisdictions joined as partners in the project.) They were an immediate success. The design was intuitive and friendly with audio instructions. A user could find information from any one of a series of approaches: touching the screen in response to icons and prompts, using the index, or searching the "How do I?" options. A map of the County allowed users to "explore" sites and learn how to reach them. Although there were only a few transactions implemented in the beginning, the number grew and continues to grow---and other jurisdictions have been added to the kiosk: Fairfax City and the Town of Warrenton are the first.

Each kiosk is unique: although it contains common community information, which is identical to that of all other kiosks, it also displays unique local information about the place where it is located. Typically, that information includes a floor plan and directional details about the building and its programs.

CRiS became one of the major cornerstones of the County's public access to information initiative, along with the Internet and Interactive Voice Response systems. As of September 1, 1999, an estimated 2,748,017 "touches" or inquiries have been made on CriS screens.

1997 - 1998

During these years, the number of kiosk installations grew from the initial 2 to 18, and the screens of information content grew from 500 to nearly 3,000. In 1997, the efforts of the CRiS Kiosk team were recognized with the County's Outstanding Performance Awards for Team Excellence. The City of Fairfax and the Town of Warrenton joined the project, and symbols of their jurisdictions are beginning to fill in the stylized opening "map" of the area. Other jurisdictions are expected to also join, and the County project is becoming a regional resource.

In order to support increased activities of all kinds a Kiosk Development Lab was established. This is where all new programming is developed and tested and where agencies can receive special training.

The Washington Metropolitan Council of Governments (COG) launched a regional "Commuter Connections" program. Their goal was increased use of public transportation to diminish air pollutants created by private automobiles. Part of their effort was the development of information kiosks in highly visible, much trafficked public areas---shopping malls primarily. In order to enhance the total appeal to these new installations, COG invited Fairfax County to place the CRiS content on the Commuter Connections kiosks placed within the County: Springfield, Fair Oaks, and Tyson's shopping malls. Very quickly, CRiS became a recognized and valued information source.

1999 - 2000

1999 is marked by moving the kiosks into a networked environment and re-design of the physical housing structure, making it more easily accessible to people in wheelchairs. All the while, the increased number of installations mandated that the project move to a networked environment for practical maintenance and technical support considerations. The network implementation completed before year's end facilitating easier maintenance and updating procedures, access to more resources, and support of more online business transactions, particularly as more agencies begin using e-commerce.

Each of the three main government centers, the Fairfax County Government Center, the Pennino Building, two more public library branches, and the Transportation Center at Tyson's West Park have new installations.

2001-2002

In 2001 , the CriS application was redesigned. The new redesign is more business oriented and conformed to the new standards. A touch screen browser was introduced in early June to allow County job information to be displayed. Information content on Fairfax County Fire & Rescue and a regional main menu was added to accommodate the growing needs of the application and content. Original content for Family Services was updated and now appears as web pages under this category. This was made available by adding two Kiosk Servers to the network for all new content for the web. Users are able to view the information on the test server and once approved the content is placed in the production environment. A new Universal Resource Locator (URL) CriS.co.Fairfax.va.us was established to launch information content from the web.

A new sound dome to accommodate the hearing impaired was placed in the Government Center and Pennino Building kiosk units. This not only improved the sound quality for the user but also reduced the noise in the immediate lobby areas.

2002-2004

A new structure was designed to include and accommodate additional features. These features will eventually allow the user to use their credit card or smart card, use a check for payment, full size keyboard with a trackball, an optical scanner to update your Virginia’s Motor Vehicle Drivers License and a telephone to access County staff as before. The structure size has a smaller foot print thus reducing additional space requirements at the locations. We have added thermal printers that can hold a minimum 300 sheets on a roll and can print both standard 8 ½ X 11 sheets or credit card receipts. The application now utilizes the ‘touch screen’ browser capability allowing users to access more web information.

We have networked over 90 % of all the kiosks units in the field. The deployment of the new structures are planned to be completed by year end 2002.

We have adapted the sound to the new structures and they will be deployed in the same time frame. Fairfax County was granted the authority to display the URL as ‘.gov’ and thus the new name ‘CRiS.fairfaxcounty.gov’ was established.

The entire application is now available as a downloadable ZIP file on the site.

The CRiS application is available at the Fairfax City Museum as of April of 2003. A new partner, ‘Town of Vienna’ came on board in July. And shortly there after the Town of Herndon was added. The Town of Warrenton was networked in September and at the same time a new structure was deployed.

2004-2005

Keeping up with the expanding popularity of CRiS kiosk, we have added new locations at Burke Lake Park for our seasonal quests, the McLean Governmental Center, Housing and Community Development Building and Adult Detention Center. With each new release an effort is made to improve the Information architecture and keep the content as current as possible. Detailed attention is given to eliminate broken links and keep the kiosk information in Sync with web information.

Since most of the information now comes from individual web sites that sometimes does not meet ADA standards for kiosks, the team worked with Fairfax County's department of Human Services to find a happy medium for displaying web information on the kiosk portal. A new standard was established to display web information in medium text font size.