Fairfax IT leaders outline unified customer portal, plan phased rollout and AI ethics oversight

Fairfax County IT leaders presented a plan to create a unified customer portal intended to let residents and businesses access multiple county services through a single entry point and one login. "It's going to provide a single point of access for residents and businesses to interact with government services," Director of DIT and CIO Matthew Harrison said.

County staff said the portal will begin as a web experience and evolve to include mobile, IVR and text-message channels, and will be designed to serve residents across abilities and languages. "The portal fits neatly into our efforts around digital modernization and the simplification of our systems and workflows," Harrison said, adding that the county will form an AI ethics committee in 2026 to govern machine-learning and generative-AI features.

Deputy director and Chief Technology Officer Maura Power said the portal aims to reduce fragmentation across department systems. "Right now, things are very fragmented," she said, noting that users often maintain separate accounts for different services. Chief Applications Officer Anita Rao described the roadmap: start with a unified digital front door and single sign-on, then add unified profiles, case management and status transparency. "Our first focus is to go to level 2, which is to create a unified digital front door for our users," Rao said.

Board members raised security and data-governance concerns. The chairman warned about protecting personally identifiable information, saying, "we have so much PII ... we need to protect that." Staff responded that they will apply security-by-design principles and data segregation and masking where necessary, and that data standards, privacy policies and data-sharing agreements will be developed as part of a planned data-lake effort.

Supervisors also pressed on how the portal will accommodate agencies with unique constraints, including the park authority, Fairfax County Public Schools and the Community Services Board, which handles regulated health data. Harrison said the initial effort will prioritize early adopters and confidence-building integrations to demonstrate capability and encourage broader agency participation over several years.

Staff emphasized workforce development and change management to avoid unintended staff displacement, describing the effort as "workforce augmentation" that will require upskilling and collective-bargaining considerations. Officials said the portal should be introduced with clear public messaging on capabilities and phased enhancements so residents understand which services are available when.

The committee heard that the county's plan calls for integrating 2 to 3 key systems and testing a version 1 of the self-service portal by fourth quarter 2026, followed by iterative enhancements based on user feedback. DIT said governance, stakeholder engagement and measurable impact tracking will guide the multi-year effort. The committee did not take formal action; staff will report back with updates at future meetings.