I received the following email from Justin Concepcion, who manages social media for Mayor Parker’s office, in response to the questions I asked in this post about how the city of Houston handles social media:
We are in the process of creating a social media policy for the City of Houston. However, currently, it is still in the draft phase. I’ve been working very closely with our legal department and a COH social media committee to ensure the policy fits all the parameters needed to address this growing field.
As far as utilizing social media, the previous administration already encouraged city departments to utilize it as a communications tool, so many of the departments already have sites established. They are listed on their respective site and on here: http://www.houstontx.gov/socialmedia/index.html – The policy we’re creating is to address growing concerns on how departments should use it and personal use by city employees.
He also said they have just released the first phase of their new website, and that he will pass along my comments about having each departments’ social media links on their homepage, which most of them already do have. My thanks to Justin for getting back to me on this.