Tech Talk Blog Seattle Information Technology

Tech Talk

Seattle Information Technology

Cyber safety first for last-minute holiday shopping

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Content courtesy of the National Cyber Security Alliance

Have some last-minute gifts to tick off your list but prefer to make purchases online instead of in the aisle? As the the window for online purchase delivery dwindles, give yourself the gift of cyber safety.

According to the National Retail Federation, 73 percent of consumers plan to use their smartphone or tablet to research or make a purchase this holiday season. Don’t let cyber grinches turn merriment into mayhem. Following some simple cybersecurity tips and practices before and while you shop online will help ensure peace of mind during the holidays and year-round.

Here are a few take-action tips for a cyber-safe season.

Keep a clean machine. Before picking out that perfect present, be sure that all internet-connected devices ‒ including PCs, smartphones and tablets ‒ are free from malware and infections by running only the most current versions of software and apps.

Use a secure Wi-Fi. Using public Wi-Fi to shop online while at your favorite coffee shop is tremendously convenient, but it is not cyber safe. Don’t make purchases via public Wi-Fi; instead use a Virtual Private Network (VPN) or your phone as a hotspot.

Lock Down Your Login. Create long and unique passphrases for all accounts and use multifactor authentication (MFA) wherever possible. MFA will fortify your online accounts by enabling the strongest authentication tools available, such as biometrics or a unique one-time code sent to your phone or mobile device

The National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA) builds strong public/private partnerships to create and implement broad-reaching education and awareness efforts to empower users at home, work and school with the information they need to keep themselves, their organizations, their systems and their sensitive information safe and secure online and encourage a culture of cybersecurity.

2020 Census is first high-tech count, what’s at stake?

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When the next United States Census arrives in April 2020, it will be the nation’s first high-tech count, with residents encouraged to primarily respond to the census survey online.

We now live in a world in which more local governments are using data to guide their decisions. There’s a lot at stake for Seattle in the 2020 U.S. Census, and the data gathered from the count could affect U.S. cities for the next decade.

While going digital could make the census more inclusive and efficient, there are potential downsides, including hard-to-count populations which are not comfortable using computers or lack access to high-speed internet. Many people have cybersecurity concerns and are cautious about sharing their data. And the threat of disinformation campaigns looms.

Seattle is responding by working with community partners to ensure historically undercounted residents receive accurate census information and know their rights.  

In April, Mayor Jenny A. Durkan, Seattle Foundation President and CEO Tony Mestres and King County Executive Dow Constantine announced the creation of a Regional Census Fund to provide $1 million in funding to help community groups prepare for the 2020 Census.

The federal government uses U.S. Census data to help decide where money should go. The more accurate the census count is in our community, the more likely our community will receive the resources that we need for important federal programs like Medicare and Medicaid, Head Start, and SNAP. The census also determines how communities are represented in state and federal legislatures. We need an accurate count in order to have more equitable representation.

At the City, we know that many communities, especially immigrant and refugee residents, do not trust our chaotic federal government and are worried that information they include on their census form will not be protected. Importantly, federal law prohibits the Census Bureau from publishing or sharing identifying information, and as of July 2019 there will not be a citizenship question on the 2020 Census form.  

Visit www.seattlecensus.org, the City of Seattle’s comprehensive resource for regular updates on the 2020 Census, including information on privacy and data protection, census trainings, and opportunities for grant funding. 

At the City, we will continue to work with our communities to ensure everyone knows their rights and can be counted in the 2020 Census.

Applying design thinking to digital government

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At the center of Seattle.gov’s online news feed is its dozens of City department blogs featuring updates from parks, police, public utilities and more. In this post, Beverly Slabosky, user experience program lead, outlines the collaborative design-thinking approach a team of city employees applied to update Citywide blog templates. Two refreshed blogs recently launched: Office of the Mayor and Seattle Department of Neighborhoods. New blog features include trending topics, related articles based on taxonomy, and a site map of all City blogs.

For a year and a half, I have led a small team of user experience designers in the Public Engagement Services Division of the Seattle Information Technology Department. Our team’s goal is to create Citywide web templates and standards so the public interacting with our 40-plus department websites will have an easier time navigating, finding information, and connecting to their City government.

We have been advocating a shift away from organizationally structured websites and applications towards a customer-centered mindset. My team uses a range of human-centered methods to bring broad groups of internal customers together to solve similar problems. I’ve adapted methods I’ve learned from more than 13 years working in the private sector in user experience, information architecture, user research, and taxonomy. Our team received a lot of positive feedback for its work, so I thought it would be a good time to reflect on my very first project.

Last year, I facilitated our first design sprint inspired by Google Venture’s model but adapted it to the needs of a government culture. Our goal was to update Citywide blog templates to better meet the needs of publishers, solve usability issues, and refresh the look and feel. I worked with two user experience designers to create an agenda, and we tag-teamed during design sessions.

We used design-thinking activities to solve real problems for humans and involve representatives across departments.

Understanding

  • We audited the City of Seattle’s 30-plus department blogs to understand their range of content and remove outdated information.
  • We analyzed Google usage data to identify which blogs received the most traffic and viewed those blog’s user paths.
  • We interviewed staff from departments with high-traffic and low-traffic blogs to understand their publishing needs and challenges.
  • We also conducted remote usability tests on select blogs to identify usability issues we could fix in the new templates.

Collaboration

We invited representatives from City departments with varying publishing needs together to share information and ideate. And staff in different roles across our Seattle IT team, including developers and web producers, also participated.

City staff participate in a blog design session.

Defining key problems

  • Department representatives shared data about the audiences they serve, what they blog about and why.
  • Together we created problem statements and voted on which problems to focus on.
  • We broke into small groups to brainstorm solutions to the problems and then shared collectively.
  • We voted again on which solutions were the most feasible and beneficial to blog readers and the staff members who maintain the blogs.

Prototyping

The designers and I came up with three prototypes to serve different publishing needs ranging from departments that publish requests for contracting bids and proposals to departments that publish videos and content from public events. We solicited feedback and co-generated a list of questions from our design session participants to test our design prototypes.

Office of the Mayor’s redesigned blog.

Usability Testing

We tested the design prototypes remotely and asked test users to navigate to blog articles, execute searches and evaluate results pages. Our biggest finding was City departments frequently use acronyms and organizational language which is confusing to readers. As a result, we’ve shifted our work to a more customer-centered focus. We accomplish this by consulting on projects and providing trainings.

New blog templates

In the end, we developed three templates for departments to choose from. The template designs are based on publishing needs and fixed usability issues. To help readers discover content, the City blogs include a few new features, including highlighted posts, trending tags, related articles based on tagging taxonomy, and a site map of all City blogs.

Seattle Department of Neighborhoods redesigned blog.

Lessons Learned

Department representatives really appreciated being part of the discovery process, which built a lot of long-term positive relationships. While I was brand new to Seattle IT and our team was new, the process was more collaborative than people expected. I heard feedback such as, “You’re running at the pace of a private sector project.” “You’re so organized,” and “This is fun.”

Over the past year, my team has worked on more experience-based projects, including helping other teams and departments approach their digital experiences with a human-centered mindset. For larger projects, we have stuck with the design sprint model, using activities from design thinking frameworks. We regularly conduct trainings to help website owners understand user experience, usability and accessibility best practices. This collaborative approach really helps our tiny team scale its reach. We look forward to continuing to grow our knowledge of City services and collaborating with other City departments so Seattle residents can more easily access their City government and public services.

Beverly Slabosky

Beverly Slabosky is the user experience program lead for Seattle IT. She manages a small, but mighty team of designers. Beverly has worked in the user experience field for 10-plus years. Before coming to the City in 2018, Beverly worked at Capital One and Premera Blue Cross and consulted for big tech companies. After many years working on business applications, eCommerce, intranets and marketing sites, she is excited to work at the City of Seattle knowing she is making a difference in her local community.

Technology Matching Fund grant applications open for 2020

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Fund invests in community projects to improve digital literacy, access to technology

Education for All, Digital Citizenship & Communication, 2017 Technology Matching Fund Project.
Photo courtesy Mohamud Yussuf.
Education for All, Digital Citizenship & Communication, 2017 Technology Matching Fund Project.

The Seattle Information Technology Department is opening the Technology Matching Fund’s 2020 cycle in conjunction with Digital Inclusion Week (Oct. 7 -11), an opportunity to raise awareness about digital inequities and nationwide efforts to close the digital divide. 

The Technology Matching Fund offers matching funds of up to $25,000 to community-led Seattle-based projects that increase digital literacy and access to free or low-cost broadband and provide technology support to underserved communities.  

“While Seattle has a long history of leading the way on digital innovation, not everyone has benefitted equally from our City’s technological revolution,” said Mayor Jenny A. Durkan. “We know that digital equity is a race and social justice issue. More and more it is becoming difficult to survive without access to high-speed internet and the skills to navigate the digital world. Access to vital services, employment, housing, and continued learning opportunities have all moved online. The Technology Matching Fund is one way that the City of Seattle is working to close the opportunity gap for low-income residents and vulnerable populations.”  

Central to the Technology Matching Fund is the community match which requires funded nonprofit organizations to match at least half of their award request with volunteer time, donated materials including hardware and software, donated professional services, or cash. 

In 2019, the City invested $320,000 in 11 projects estimated to reach more than 3,400 residents — including 1,700 immigrants and refugees, 250 youth, 570 seniors and 900 people with disabilities. The City’s investment will be matched with a projected $302,915 in community resources. In an effort to fund more projects, the maximum award amount in the current funding cycle is $25,000, down from $50,000 in recent years.   

“Everyone should be on equal footing in an increasingly digitally-driven world. A lack of connectivity and digital literacy skills makes it difficult for people to be successful in modern society,” said Seattle City Council President Bruce Harrell and chair of the Governance, Equity & Technology Committee. “Improving digital equity has been a major commitment of mine, and I am inspired by the impact of our investments designed to reduce and eliminate barriers to technology access and use.” 

The Technology Matching Fund application and guidelines are available at seattle.gov/tech/initiatives/digital-equity/technology-matching-fund. The application deadline is Monday, Jan. 13, 2020, at 5 p.m. 

“In Seattle, we’re working diligently to close the digital divide in partnership with a diverse group of community partners,” said Seattle’s Chief Technology Officer Saad Bashir. “This funding cycle, we look forward to streamlining the Technology Matching Fund review process to get our investments into the community more quickly.” 

Learn what makes a strong application by attending a workshop. The sessions will cover specifics on eligibility and how to apply. While attendance is not required, first-time applicants are encouraged to attend. 

Grant Workshops 

Wednesday, Nov. 6, 5:30 – 7 p.m. 
2100 Building, Community Room B, 2100 24th Ave S.  

Friday, Nov. 22, 10:30 a.m. – 12 p.m. 
Northgate Branch Library, 10548 5th Ave N.E. 

Saturday, Dec. 7, 10:30 a.m. – 12 p.m. 
Rainier Beach Branch Library, 9125 Rainier Ave S. 

Interpretation and accommodations at the workshops are available upon request. Call (206) 233-2751 or email communitytechnology@seattle.gov. 

The Technology Matching Fund was created in 1997 and has since awarded more than $5 million to organizations funding more than 300 community technology projects. The grants are funded through the city’s broadband franchise agreement. 

What is a Cybersecurity Threat?

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A Cybersecurity threat is the threat of a malicious act resulting in an adversary attempting to gain unauthorized access to a system. They are often launched by criminal or politically motivated groups looking to steal money, data, intellectual property, or simply to disrupt normal operations of their target.    

Defining Common Threats 

Below are four common cybersecurity threats you may have heard about recently. These threats are intertwined and typically used in tandem. For example, a ransomware attack may be deployed through a phish, which utilizes social engineering to make a staff person believe the email actually came from their boss. 

  1. Phishing: a malicious hacker tries to trick the victim into believing they’re legitimate to get username and password credentials or other identifying information. If you think you’ve been phished, change your password. Implementing multi-factor authentication (MFA) on your systems is another great way to keep your system secure. 
  1. Ransomware: A type of malicious software designed to block access to data or systems until a sum of money is paid, typically through bitcoin. It is typically delivered through phishing and malicious email attachments, beginning with a single workstation and spreading throughout the technology environment.
  1. Social engineering: The use of deception and manipulation to trick individuals into divulging confidential or personal information. Staff should always be vigilant in confirming the identity of individuals before divulging personal information and verify the authenticity of links or emails before clicking on them by checking the URL for odd characteristics. 
  1. Malware/Spyware: Software that aims to collect a person or organization’s information, without their knowledge or consent.

What Can You Do?

Clean off your virtual desktop!

Files saved to your desktop are subject to different data protection practices and may not be backed up.

Need more ideas on how to be more cyber secure?

Stop. Think. Connect.

https://www.stopthinkconnect.org/

City of Seattle invests $320,000 to improve digital literacy, access to technology

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Eleven Technology Matching Fund recipients aim to close digital divide

The Seattle City Council approved $320,000 in funding for community-led projects that increase digital literacy. The Technology Matching Fund grants were awarded to 11 projects that will reach an estimated 3,000 residents, increasing their access to technology and digital skills training.

“Access to technology and digital literacy is an equity issue. Important tasks like applying for jobs, finding healthcare, accessing childcare, and even communicating with our loved ones in times of need have all moved online, making internet access and digital skills more critical than ever. Furthering technology equity and access is an important way to create opportunity for historically underserved neighborhoods,” said Mayor Jenny A. Durkan. “These investments allow our communities to capitalize on technology and job training while making a more inclusive, just city.”

This year’s recipients include a program offering youth with disabilities and English-language learners  hands-on training in sound and multimedia technologies, a computer lab to serve low-income and homeless people, a career-training program in web design and coding for low-income women of color, and a digital literacy curriculum for indigenous artists. 

Technology Matching Fund grants are distributed annually as part of the city’s broader Digital Equity Initiative. Funded projects improve connectivity and provide devices and technology support to communities that might not have equitable access. The funded organizations, selected from a pool of 47 applicants, will reach more than 3,000 residents, including immigrants, refugees, homeless residents, seniors, youth, and people with disabilities.

“I have seen this program grow and evolve over the years and I’m looking forward to seeing what this particular group of awardees will accomplish over the next year,” said Seattle Council President Bruce Harrell and chair of the Governance, Equity & Technology Committee. “Improving digital equity has been a major commitment of mine and I am very pleased to see how this funding will address some of our city’s most pressing needs.”

The Technology Matching Fund awards up to $50,000 to non-profit organizations in Seattle for digital-equity projects. City dollars are matched at 50 percent with cash or in-kind contributions of labor, software, hardware, supplies and services. This year’s projects will provide a projected $302,000 in matching resources. 

“We want to do our part to level the technology learning field and give all Seattle residents the educational opportunities afforded to them despite access or income level,” said Seattle’s Chief Technology Officer Saad Bashir. “Our goal is to continue to narrow the digital divide.”

The 2019 Technology Matching Fund recipients:

  • Atlantic Street Center
  • Computing For All
  • Dress for Success Seattle
  • Full Life Care
  • Indigenouz PlaceMakerz
  • Jack Straw Foundation
  • Kin On Health Care Center
  • Multimedia Resources and Training Institute
  • Real Change Homeless Empowerment Project
  • Seattle Neighborhood Group
  • South Park Information and Resource Center 

The Technology Matching Fund was created in 1997 and has since awarded more than $5 million to organizations, funding more than 300 community technology projects. The grants are funded through the city’s broadband franchise agreements.

To learn more about the City of Seattle’s commitment to Digital Equity and the Technology Matching Fund, visit http://www.seattle.gov/tech/initiatives/digital-equity/technology-matching-fund.

Tech Talk Tuesday: Summer webinars offer tips on building to meet demand for broadband

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More than half of Seattleites live in apartments, condominiums and townhomes, known as multiple-dwelling-units or MDUs. And permitting records show nearly 81 percent of Seattle’s new housing builds are MDUs. These residents want access to abundant, high-speed broadband. They rate it as the top amenity when considering a place to live – outranking an in-unit washer and dryer.

While today’s connected mindset has changed the housing market, access to competitive, high-speed options is often limited by outdated wiring in older buildings or a lack of technology planning in new construction.

Enter Seattle’s Office of Cable Communications’ Build for Broadband initiative, an awareness and education effort designed to help building owners, property managers and developers navigate the challenges of providing broadband. The initiative includes a series of free summer webinars with a focus on planning for broadband like any other utility during new construction or during renovations of older buildings.

The Office of Cable Communications recently offered two lunchtime webinars with three more planned. Previous topics included broadband technology 101 and infrastructure pathways for MDU broadband. You can listen to recordings of previous webinars here. The next webinar, noon, Thursday, July 25, will cover G.Fast, an emerging technology to increase broadband speeds using existing wiring in older buildings. Get more details here and register here.

Two August webinars will cover wired and wireless options for broadband and offer an overview of the types of common agreements involved with bringing internet services to an MDU. August webinar dates will be announced soon. Sign up here to get webinar updates and other Build for Broadband news.

The Build for Broadband website offers more information, including Tip-6000, Ensuring Broadband Service Access for MDU Development Projects; broadband provider contacts for service to MDUs; and links to other MDU broadband-related resources.

Alice Lawson

For more information about building for broadband, contact Alice Lawson, broadband and cable program manager, at alice.lawson@seattle.gov or (206) 684-5957.

Alice Lawson is a strategic advisor who’s spent that past decade working on cable, broadband and telecom policy and consumer protection issues. She’s a native Seattleite who’s passionate about supporting city efforts to ensure preparedness for the evolving broadband future, and ensuring the future includes equitable access for all residents.

Tech Talk Tuesday: New Dataset Helps Fuel Parking Choices for Seattle Drivers

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Photo of Seattle parking pay station

One of the most comprehensive parking datasets ever released by a major U.S. city is now available to Seattle residents and visitors to help cut down on time spent searching for a parking spot. This paid parking occupancy data dates back to 2012 and will help drivers make data-driven parking decisions and manage difficult parking situations.  

Whether planning a weekend shopping trip to downtown, attending a performance at a popular theater, or sporting event, drivers in Seattle can now figure out the best spots near their destination. All they need to do is search for Paid Parking on the City of Seattle’s Open Data Portal. 

This metadata is being made available thanks to a partnership with Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) and Tyler Technologies.  

“Our team is proud to support Seattle’s initiative to publish machine-readable parking transaction data for researchers, developers, and the public to use to run analysis, build apps, and find a smarter way for people to park,” said Franklin Williams, president of the Data & Insights Division of Tyler Technologies. “Sharing 1.5 billion rows of data is no small feat. Not only is this the largest dataset on the Seattle open data portal, it’s one of the largest datasets Socrata powers.” 

With the adoption of a new parking policy in 2010, a goal was set to have one to two spaces available throughout the day. This plan is monitored with an Annual Paid Parking Study that implements changes to parking rates, hours of operations, and time limits based on information received. This information automatically generates several datasets: 

  • Paid Parking (Last 48 Hours) 
  • Paid Parking (Last 30 days) 
  • Paid Parking (Year to date) 
  • Historical archives by year going back to 2012 

Seattle Information Technology’s Open Data and Business Intelligence teams worked through technical and organizational hurdles to make this data available to the public. 

“To help realize the power of this valuable dataset, SDOT and Seattle IT have partnered with a graduate research team from the University of Washington’s iSchool to develop a predictive model of parking availability. Leveraging recent developments in big data analytics and modern cloud tooling, this graduate team aims to discover statistically significant signals that can affect parking availability, and ultimately help the City improve public policy and infrastructure that makes parking easier for Seattle drivers,” said Open Data Manager Paul Alley.  

Key factors of Seattle’s paid parking system include: 

  • Roughly 11 million parking transactions occur with 12,000 paid spaces on 1,500 block-faces (one side of a street between intersections) 
  • Most areas operate Monday through Saturday between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. Some paid areas end at 6 p.m. (about 25%), 10 p.m. (10%), or 4 p.m. There is no paid parking on Sundays 
  • Maximum time limits are 2-hour (65%), 10-hour (8%), 30 minutes (~2%), or 4-hour (25%) 
  • Hourly rates set by paid parking area or sub area and by time of day vary between $.50 per hour and $5.00 per hour 
  • Spaces are not marked so parking is allowed anywhere along a block-face which can create full occupancy when cars have squeezed into spaces or many small cars park on one block 
  • Overnight parking is allowed when parkers purchase time for the following morning 

This data set has been reviewed with the City’s Privacy Program. It does not contain any personally identifiable information. There is no vehicle license plates or vehicle registration data. The data set refreshes overnight but there is a 7-day delay in the information. The City is working to make datasets on parking transactions and paid spaces available this year. 

Looking for candidates to fill a few key positions as we restructure our department

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We’re recruiting for a few key positions in the Seattle Information Technology department (Seattle IT) as we restructure and refocus our efforts to deliver best-in-class, client-focused service. These positions are essential to Seattle Information Technology’s transition. Applicants must clearly state how they meet the required qualifications.

We’re looking for strong candidates to apply for the following roles:

Position: Enterprise Architect

The Enterprise Architect serves as a member of a growing team of Enterprise Architects and reports to the Lead Enterprise Architect within the Service Modernization division of Seattle IT. This role guides the selection of technologies and technology solutions that support expected business outcomes, meet current and future business needs as well as functional and non-functional requirements.

Open until August 13, 2019 at 4 p.m. Full job description and link to apply.

Position: Senior Applications Developer

This position is responsible for the operations and maintenance, incremental enhancements, troubleshooting and repair of Oracle Utilities Applications and integration components, which are built upon Oracle Weblogic Java EE application servers, its integration with Oracle Service Bus (OSB) and Oracle databases, Solaris operating system, and batch job application processes. 

Open until August 20, 2019 at 4 p.m. Full job description and link to apply.

Position: Director of Service Modernization (Repost)

The Director of Service Modernization is primarily responsible for strategic leadership and execution of IT modernization processes and functions.  This includes defining services, establishing standards and processes and delivery and reporting on service metrics.  The Director will translate high-level organization objectives into achievable plans, which should include measuring and analyzing trade-offs to maximize value for operations, customers, and technical teams.

Open continuously. Full job description and link to apply.

Position: IT Applications Manager

This position supervises a team of senior IT staff focused on supporting enterprise and operationally critical applications. This team provides a wide spectrum of services (i.e. designing, developing, integrating, system analysis, implementing and supporting) for Work, Asset and Inventory Management (WAI) applications citywide.

Open until August 27, 2019 at 4 p.m. Full job description and link to apply.

Position: Senior Business Analyst, Concept Consultation (Temporary)

This role supports all aspects of our four-pillar approach to business analysis, including adherence to the BABOK standards, organizational change management, performance metrics based upon balanced scorecard, and continuous process improvement when designing future state.

Open until August 27, 2019 at 4 p.m. Full job description and link to apply.

Tech Talk Tuesday: Vendor Forum Offers Window into City and County Technology Partnerships

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2018 vendor forum attendees participate in speed networking session
2018 Vendor Forum

Seattle Information Technology (Seattle IT) and King County Information Technology (KCIT) are jointly hosting their annual IT Vendor Forum this Thursday, May 16, 2019 at Seattle’s City Hall. This event is held every year to lay the groundwork for successful future partnerships with technology organizations. The goal is to give attendees a chance to learn how to do business with the City of Seattle and King County, hear about upcoming technology projects, and speak with managers one on one. This event also gives Seattle IT and KCIT the chance hear ideas and solutions from our local technology community.

Interested in joining us? Here’s what to expect?

Make sure to bring business cards and wear comfortable shoes. Have a short introduction prepared for the five-minute networking sessions and come with ideas! There is no sign-up for the networking session this year. Project leads will be on hand to speak to you in the following categories: • Collaboration Tools

  • Automation
  • Network and Applications Monitoring
  • Data Analytics
  • GIS
  • Project Management
  • Digital Security
  • New Technologies

If you have not done business with the City of Seattle or King County before or need to change your status to include the women or minority-owned business designation, you can do it at this event.

Details:

Where: Seattle City Hall Bertha Knight Landes Conference Room

When: Doors open for the morning session at 9:30 a.m. The session runs from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. Doors open for the afternoon session at 12:30 p.m. with session at 1 – 3 p.m.

Parking: There is no public parking at City Hall. There are several parking garages in the area. Street parking is limited.

We look forward to seeing you at the 5th Annual Seattle IT/King County IT Vendor Forum! Go to our Vendor Forum page for more information, or to join our Listserv to get updates on the Vendor Forum throughout the year.