Information Officer, ‘80s style

As a member of the three-person “information services” team at the City of Nepean, my colleague Lois and I were essentially the city’s 4-1-1 service. In the days before databases and the internet, residents often turned to City Hall for answers to questions as wide-ranging as “how do I get Mom placed in an old folks’ home?” to “how do I get rid of the skunk under my porch?” to “where is the nearest bus stop?”

Over the course of a couple of years, we built the Black Book – a three-ring binder stuffed with every scrap of information we would possibly need. Our motto was that if we didn’t have the answer, we would find it and get back to the citizen. We sourced out provincial and federal contacts, community organizations, advocacy groups, crisis and information lines – everything we could to add to our bag of tricks.

I see now that we were trying to be the “Service Canada” of the City of Nepean: no wrong door, focused on service, we always delivered for our clients. But it sure would have been easier with a database…