County Resident Information Services (CRiS)

Recently Fairfax County, The Redmon Group of Alexandria, VA and the International Center for Applied Studies in Information Technology (ICASIT) at George Mason University teamed up to implement the County Resident Information Services (CRiS) project, a state-of-the-art multi-media kiosk system providing area information to Fairfax County residents. As one of the most substantial information dissemination efforts in the area, the Fairfax County Government in Virginia contracted the Redmon Group to develop the 500+ screen multimedia kiosks for the County Libraries. ICASIT Director Dr. Stephen Ruth collaborated with Redmon on the effort while ICASIT members Todd Kelly and Bryan Harter provide on-site and programming support to the project.

CRIS navigates the user through the use of a touch screen kiosk design. From the main screen, the user follows the friendly graphics to obtain information in categories such as "Living Here", "Libraries" and "Exploring the County." CRIS uniquely integrates both still graphics as well as video and sound which complements the user's learning experience. Users are even provided a map of the county and are able to locate such places as libraries or police stations by scrolling through the map, and can even pay their taxes using their Discover Card through the system. Residents can also use the map to find elected county representatives, their photos, and phone numbers as well as other contact information.

CRIS has also proved to be a useful tool for job seekers in the County government. It is updated about every two weeks with new information on employment opportunities within the county. By touching the screen, users are also able to obtain the employment description and an application form with instructions.

The CRIS project represents a collaborative effort between the public sector, private sector and the university to provide a necessary service to residents through the application of Information Technology.

What's next for CRIS? Two new features are being deployed this summer. First, CRIS is being configured to allow county residents to pay their county taxes and other fees by credit card. CRIS will be directly linked into the Discover card system, adding yet another convenient feature for its users. Second, CRIS is being configured for automated updating through a Client Server platform. Updates to the system can now be performed in a much less time consuming matter offering the users real-time updated information.

For more information about the project, or to see a demonstration, contact ICASIT at (703) 993-3522 or via email, intech@gmu.edu.

Click below to view samples of CRiS:

Demonstration 1
Demonstration 2