Is Coronavirus a Catalyst for Telecommuting to City Hall?

Source: Gov Tech Published: April 17, 2020

Before the outbreak of the COVID-19 crisis, the local government in Kansas City, Mo., had never done a work-from-home program.

Assistant City Manager Rick Usher recalls a few discussions about the potential of having employees work from home, but the city had never put anything substantial into place. When the virus hit, however, that had to change, and it had to change quickly. Now, Kansas City is on its fifth week of an emergency telecommuting program that includes roughly 600 employees spread across 19 different departments.

And Usher said during a recent phone conversation with Government Technology that the city is learning valuable and potentially lasting lessons from all of this, lessons with the potential to lead to a change institutionwide in work-from-home policy.

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