The Town of Normal is making Smart Cities technology a big priority. The City of Bloomington has been less vocal on that front, but Bloomington also is leveraging new tech.
Smart Cities technology, broadly defined, is supposed to make city operations smoother for the public and more efficient for the municipality.
Bloomington Deputy City Manager Billy Tyus said it's in every conversation staff has.
"Everything from when we're put in lighting — are there ways to implement smart technology. Are there opportunities to implement wireless technology? Are there opportunities to do other things as part of the planning process?" Tyus said on WGLT's Sound Ideas.
Tyus said smart tech will be a key part of the downtown streetscape plan under development.
And it's part of a new open government platform approved for Bloomington's community development department that will let contractors and property owners complete permit applications and other city business online.
"If we're seeing that we're starting to see an uptick in foot traffic when this system is designed to have people do this work online, we can then look at what we need to do to make this system easier to access. Or maybe we need to do more marketing to make sure people know that it's out there," said Tyus.
The city also will be able to track the time it takes to process a permit, he said. And if that takes too long, it will trigger a review of what can be done differently to make things more efficient.
Smart Cities technology can be expensive, and many cities have to make special arrangements to implement and pay for it. Tyus said those only go so far.
"In a lot of instances, this type of work is also related to opportunities that come about as well. Sometimes there will be opportunities that we need to take advantage of that we haven't necessarily planned for. It's a bit of a balancing act," he said.
The city is upgrading its back-end data system and moving it to the cloud, too.
Tyus said new police technology approved by the city council this week will save officers a lot of time. The council signed off on $2 million in purchases over five years. The new tech will coordinate various devices to make sure video footage records without as many actions by officers.
"The new system that we're going to get automatically syncs the recording, the firearm, and the tasers. There is a triggering mechanism that allows all that to work together," said Tyus, adding body camera footage will automatically synchronize with servers. Officers currently have to manually upload the data.
Jelani Day
Tyus declined to address an appeal from the mother of Illinois State University student Jelani Day. Carmen Bolden Day Monday asked the city counciland staff to intervene to get more information from police investigating her son's death.
Tyus would not even address a media question about the appropriate limits of staff and council involvement in police issues.
"We also understand Miss Bolden Day's question and the pain of losing a child. We understand that for sure," said Tyus. "But it's not something I can't comment on at this time. It's a police investigation. Anything I would say could have an impact on that."
Tyus said the big thing for members of the public to do is to call the FBI tip line if they have information about the case.
Day disappeared in August 2021 and was found dead in the Illinois River weeks later. He was last seen in Bloomington.
