Modernizing Constituent Applications for Local Government

Local government agencies face significant pressure to deliver essential constituent services quickly and efficiently. These services can include processing housing applications, handling public records requests, and issuing zoning permits, and each one relies on agreements. 

Processing agreements like lease approvals, compliance documentation, and interdepartmental forms should be a streamlined, digital experience. However, outdated manual processes, disconnected tools, and high application volumes slow you down, making it harder to serve your community efficiently. If you’re relying on Word, Excel, or Google Drive to manage agreements, you're likely dealing with manual data transfers that introduce errors and delays. 

Each time data is manually moved, there’s an increased risk of being misplaced, altered, or ending up in a format that’s hard to analyze. These inefficiencies create bottlenecks and slow down citizen services—a cycle we call the “Agreement Trap.” The Agreement Trap carries huge costs for local cities and municipalities. For example, disconnected agreement management workflows can cause significant delays, taking two weeks longer to complete the agreement lifecycle. In addition, organizations waste 6,000 hours per year to organize, store, and manage agreements.

The impact of the Agreement Trap on housing applications 

Think about the housing application process: Applicants submit forms online, in person, or by mail, depending on what’s most convenient for them. Then, they need to supply additional paperwork or documentation, such as identification, income statements, tax returns, and employment records. You then have to conduct a thorough review of each applicant’s documentation, host interviews, and determine eligibility. Even after an applicant is assigned a unit and has moved in, they have to verify their income annually, and you have to match it against the program’s eligibility criteria.

Now, layer in your daily challenges. With stretched resources, keeping up with applications is difficult, especially when serving non-English speakers, elderly residents, or people with disabilities. Scattered systems and manual data entry slow you down, introduce errors, and create security risks, making it harder to connect the dots across departments.

And it’s not just housing applications. The Agreement Trap is likely a source of waste and inefficiency for a wide range of your teams, programs, and processes:

• HR teams deal with employee dissatisfaction and lose top talent to the private sector

• Procurement teams are also held back, struggling to track contract terms and SLAs effectively, limiting the value of your agreements

• Legal teams are bogged down with time-consuming contract reviews, which can delay important projects and increase risk exposure

• City clerks must manage public records, ensure compliance with open records laws, and process large volumes of documents, leading to delays in responses to public requests and challenges in maintaining accurate, up-to-date records

These inefficiencies don’t just create headaches, they hold you back from maximizing your technology investments and delivering the best outcomes for your community. 

The right tools, the right outcomes

With the right tools, you can transform how you manage citizen services like housing applications. By streamlining and accelerating the application process, you can manage high volumes more effectively and reduce wait times for applicants. With Docusign Intelligent Agreement Management (IAM), this transformation isn’t just a possibility, it's within your reach.

Not only does this lighten the administrative loads on your staff, but it also enhances service quality for your residents. In addition, secure identity verification helps you protect sensitive applicant data while ensuring compliance with federal, state, and local regulations.

And by incorporating accessibility features such as multilingual, user-friendly applications, you can lower entry barriers and create a more equitable experience for all residents. Modernizing your agreement management processes doesn’t just make the process smoother, it helps you better serve your community.

Docusign IAM powers a faster, simpler housing application process 

Managing housing applications doesn’t have to be a maze of paperwork, slow approvals, and disconnected systems. With the Docusign IAM platform, you can simplify the entire process, creating a seamless experience for both your team and the residents you serve.

This all-in-one platform builds on the power of eSignature, a trusted tool for governments, and introduces new capabilities that take efficiency to the next level:

• Docusign Maestro: Standardize and automate every step of the housing application process—from submission to eligibility verification to lease agreements—ensuring consistency, reducing errors, and keeping applicants informed

• Docusign App Center: Seamlessly integrate with key technologies you rely on, like Salesforce and Microsoft, to eliminate manual data entry, making it easier to track applications, verify documents, and process approvals faster

• Docusign eSignature: Enable applicants to securely sign housing agreements from anywhere, on any device—reducing paperwork, speeding up approvals, and improving accessibility for all participants

• Docusign Navigator: Store and organize housing authority partnership agreements securely in a centralized repository, making it easy to track terms, identify key obligations, and retrieve the latest versions with confidence

Local government agencies have a vital mission of taking care of constituents. With Docusign IAM, you’re not just managing agreements—you’re unlocking a faster, more efficient way to serve your community.