Civic Innovators

Longmont is one of Colorado's most recognized civic innovators - its community-owned NextLight fiber network made it the state's first gigabit city. That same forward-leaning culture shows up inside Development Services, where Adrian Lewis has spent nine years as the full end-to-end owner of the city's Accela platform, building the back end, the front end, and the workflows for every department.This episode follows Longmont's evolution from a mature permitting operation into a testbed for what's next: citizen self-service through OpenCounter, digital plan review with ePermitHub, and an early pilot of AI-assisted plan review. Running through it all is a challenge every agency is facing - the "Silver Tsunami" of retiring expertise - and the question of how you capture institutional knowledge and build systems that outlast any one person. It's also a funding story: Longmont paid for both OpenCounter and ePermitHub with grant dollars, and Longmont can walk through how they found those grants and made the case internally.Learn more at accela.com/podcast.

In this milestone episode, Civic Innovators welcomes a new co-host: Rob Lloyd, Director of the Center for Digital Government and former CTO of Seattle and San Jose. With over 30 years of civic technology leadership, Rob brings a rare dual perspective, having built transformation initiatives from inside city government and now advising municipalities nationwide.

Rob and host Noel Reininger dig into what it actually takes to modernize civic operations. Rob argues that technology is often the easiest part of the equation; the harder work is listening, aligning departments, and understanding how permitting, licensing, and code enforcement connect to bigger outcomes like public safety, economic development, and housing security.

The conversation covers:

• Why successful transformation requires aligning three levels of an organization: operational, managerial, and strategic.
• How the best government leaders are bringing CIOs into strategic conversations early, rather than treating technology as an afterthought.
• A five-part framework for where AI can add real value in planning and permitting: improving rules and regulations, conversational bots for constituents, pre-check submittals, process optimization, and benchmarking across cities.
• Why building a partner ecosystem, rather than trying to solve everything in-house, is critical for cities navigating rapid technology change.
• How regulatory environments are constantly shifting, and why the ability to update systems quickly matters as much as the systems themselves.

Whether you're a city leader starting a modernization effort or a technologist working alongside government, this conversation offers a grounded look at what separates organizations that transform successfully from those that stall.

How does a city turn raw permitting data into real operational insight?

In this episode, Accela CEO Noam Reininger and e.Republic Chief Innovation Officer Joe Morris talk with Rob Liddicoat, Deputy Director of Community Development for the City of Stockton, California, about Stockton's journey from anecdotal performance explanations to data-driven KPIs and real-time dashboards.

Rob walks through how Stockton's team built custom calculations from Accela's enhanced reporting database, developed workload monitoring dashboards that gave every department visibility into "who has the ball," and used that clarity to shift from reactive firefighting to proactive operational management.

The results speak for themselves: initial review targets for new commercial construction projects went from being met just 17% of the time to over 85%, and multifamily residential projects went from 3% to 100% in the most recent six-month period.

In this episode, you'll learn:

- How to build trustworthy KPIs from existing workflow history data

- Why standardizing workflows makes performance metrics easier to calculate

- How shared visibility changes accountability across departments

- The policy change Stockton made after tracking review cycle counts

- Practical advice for agencies just starting their own data journey.

Learn more at accela.com.

What does it take to go fully paperless overnight?

In 2017, Mesa, Arizona eliminated paper from permitting, planning, and licensing entirely. No phased rollout. No fallback. Just a full commitment to digital transformation.

In this episode, Heather Bassford, Development Services, and Samuel Small, Senior Software Engineer, from the City of Mesa join Accela CEO Noam Reininger and eRepublic's Joe Morris to share how they pulled it off, and what they'd tell every other city still on the fence.

What you'll hear:

• How Mesa built trust with contractors, developers, and mom-and-pop applicants
• How they cut right-of-way permit processing from 15 minutes to 15 seconds
• Why low-code tools let their team respond to new regulations in days
• How data democratization changed the way leadership makes decisions

If your city is weighing a big digital move and wondering how to manage the change, this episode is for you.

Learn more at accela.com.

What does it take to modernize one of America's most complex permitting systems and make it work for residents?In this episode of Civic Innovators, we visit Cleveland, Ohio, where Mayor Justin Bibb's Cleveland Era agenda is transforming how the city delivers services. With nearly $2 billion in annual construction permitting and projects requiring review from up to 16 departments, Cleveland faced a real challenge: too much paper, too little visibility, and a process that left residents and businesses in the dark.Kimberly Roy Wilson, Director of Information Technology, and Sally Martin O'Toole, Director of Building and Housing, share how Cleveland moved its permitting and plan review to the cloud, deployed a citywide electronic plan room, and built real-time KPI dashboards that drive daily decisions, from clearing backlogs to making the case for additional staff capacity.The result? A transparent, data-driven process that holds both government and applicants accountable and keeps Cleveland moving at the speed of business.Learn more at accela.com/podcast.

On this episode of Civic Innovators, we spotlight how Patrick Miner and Butte County are redefining disaster recovery and community resilience by leveraging Accela’s scalability and automation. Patrick shares his firsthand experience rebuilding after catastrophic wildfires, the challenges of operating with minimal resources, and how technology enables small teams to deliver big results for their communities.Learn more at accela.com/podcast.

On this episode of Civic Innovators, we spotlight how Memphis/Shelby County’s Develop901 initiative is transforming development management, connecting departments, and driving efficiency through Accela. Nidia Logan-Robinson shares the story of building a common platform, fostering partnerships, and making it easier to do business in the region.

Learn more at accela.com/podcast

When Eric Landon, Growth Management Director for Citrus County, Florida, faced 90-day permit delays and mounting constituent complaints, he knew something had to change. But instead of rushing into a technology solution, he did something radical: he got in pickup trucks with contractors and asked end users what they actually needed.

In this episode of Civic Innovators, hosts Noam Reininger, CEO of Accela, and Joe Morris, Chief Innovation Officer at Government Technology, sit down with Eric to unpack how Citrus County transformed their permitting operation—processing 20,000 permits and 80,000 inspections annually—into a customer-centric model that launched with barely a complaint.

You'll learn:

• Why Eric believes they're not a building department, but a customer service department
• How involving stakeholders in system selection turned potential adversaries into teammates
• The "soft opening" strategy that lets contractors beta test the new system
• How offering multiple learning paths (YouTube videos, classroom training, and white-glove concierge service) prevented launch chaos
• Why silence from elected officials became the ultimate measure of success
• What's next: expanding service requests across all county departments for true transparency and accountability

This is a masterclass in change management, stakeholder engagement, and putting people before technology. Whether you're facing your own digital transformation or looking to improve constituent services, Eric's practical approach offers a roadmap for making it work.

Learn more at accela.com.

On this episode, we will spotlight how the City of San Diego built a successful IT-business partnership to deliver effective technology solutions. Elyse Lowe and Jonathan Behnke join us to discuss how collaboration, shared leadership, and strategic alignment are driving better outcomes for all stakeholders. 

In this episode of Civic Innovators, we sit down with Nicole Ubbink, Assistant Director of Community and Economic Development for Merced County, California, to explore how the county achieved a 72% improvement in permits processed within just 90 days of launching a new digital platform.

Merced County recently unified its entire permitting and land management operations—moving to 100% online submittals and payments, streamlining internal workflows, and breaking down departmental silos that had existed for years. This transformation didn’t just modernize operations—it reshaped how staff work, how citizens engage, and how departments collaborate.

Learn more at accela.com/podcast.