ISC Community Membership Guidelines

Our hypothesis is that building collaboratively across jurisdictions saves governments time and money while producing better outcomes for the public. As we’ve grown this project, we’ve discovered more and more cooperative organizations doing just that, but they’re often unaware of each other. We’re fostering a community of practice to create space for cooperatives to connect and learn from each other.

An intergovernmental software cooperative is made up of two or more government agencies jointly supporting the development of software for their collective use, operating under some kind of a governance structure. This can manifest in a variety of sharing models, and you can learn more in our landscape report, “How Agencies Are Cooperatively Building Mission-Critical Software”.

Any government (municipal, county, state, territorial, tribal) or interagency organization that develops or is interested in developing shared software is welcome to be a member. Join our mailing list if you’d like to be invited to future meetings.

If you’re interested in the topic of shared services, but don’t know if this is the right group for you, please reach out to Shelby at ss4716 [at] georgetown.edu. We’d love to chat!

In exchange for participating, members receive:

Peer-to-peer learning from a community of cooperatives who are also working on government shared software
Opportunities to network and collaborate across government jurisdictions
Access and ability to contribute to a shared knowledge base of articles, promising practices, playbooks, etc. around software collaboration

What’s the format:

There is no cost to participate!
We have a monthly members meeting focused on a specific topic (e.g. funding opportunities and models, outsourcing vs. insourcing, developing shared standards, etc.). Everyone joins a one-hour Zoom meeting where we discuss the topic and share the latest findings from our research and best practices from existing projects, and suggest areas of collaboration.
In addition, we have regular events open to members and the public featuring a guest speaker or panel. These events highlight case studies and the “art of the possible” for collaborative approaches to shared services.
Optionally, we can meet with your organization 1:1 to consult on implementation of promising practices in the shared software space

Some of our current members include: American Association of Motor Vehicles Administrators (AAMVA), Association of Oregon Counties, Child Care Aware, Digital Towpath, National Association for Public Health Statistics and Information Systems (NAPHSIS), Turtle Creek Valley Council of Governments.

Thank you to Marina Nitze and her Child Welfare Playbook for her amazing membership format!