This piece has been contributed by Datacom’s Datascape team.
Councils work hard every day to keep their communities running, but the systems sitting behind that work don’t always keep pace.
A resident might submit a request through the website, only for an officer to later re-enter the details into the CRM. The field team then picks up the job through a different system, and the update eventually filters back by email. With nothing confirming that the work is complete, the resident ends up calling to check on progress.
While individually, each part of the process is functional, the disconnect between each step is where issues arise. The cost of this disconnection compounds silently across thousands of council interactions every week and impacts delivery and productivity, which in turn limits growth.
Despite most councils facing this architecture problem, few address it directly. Layers of legacy technology – along with newer platforms added over time in well-intentioned attempts to patch the gaps – leave teams working within a structure that can feel too complex to change. Fragmentation builds quietly over years of point solutions and well‑intentioned decisions, until every new tool sits alongside the others rather than working with them.
What changes when the pieces connect
Hauraki District Council faced their own challenges with disconnected architecture a few years ago. Their website was hosted on a CMS no longer supported by the provider, and online services through their existing systems were limited. The council needed to modernise, but the question wasn’t just what to replace – it was how to ensure the next thing they built could continue to grow.
They chose to start with Datacom’s MyDatascape and Datascape Websites, taking a gradual approach at a pace that gave their teams time to adapt.
“We were fortunate to have the luxury of time, which allowed us to gradually introduce core components of MyDatascape and incorporate additional business functions over time, particularly those involving customer interactions for renewals, applications, and payments, with a focus on streamlining the overall process from the customer’s perspective,” says Matthew Radford, IT Manager at Hauraki District Council.”
Having a shared foundation made the difference that individual products had been trying to make.
“Everything was integrated within a single product suite. We didn’t have to use separate platforms for website functionality, customer services, and payment processing. It may sound generic, but it’s an incredibly powerful platform. There’s so much that you can do with it.”
When everything flows smoothly between touchpoints, it builds a system in which each improvement makes the next easier, and outcomes snowball. The implementation of MyDatascape has had a significant impact on Hauraki District Council’s operations and community engagement.
The council initially focused on improving customer interaction and simplifying self-servicing processes. Over time, it has led to the automation of internal business processes, reducing administrative overhead and improving efficiency. Hauraki has since moved into Antenno for community engagement and is developing a library subsite. Each new step extends what’s already connected rather than adding another standalone tool.
Why connected architecture matters now more than ever
When Datascape surveyed over 160 council leaders and staff across Australia and New Zealand in 2025, the findings reinforced what the Hauraki story illustrates: the biggest barrier to progress isn’t ambition – it’s architecture.
Most councils say they’re actively working on AI – trialling it for community enquiry triage, asset condition reporting, inspection summaries and document drafting. Nearly half of New Zealand respondents are exploring through pilots. A smaller group is scaling use cases across teams. Very few have AI embedded in everyday operations.
The councils making the most ground share the common trait of working from a connected foundation where AI has native access to data structures, permissions and workflows across functions.
AI that sits outside core systems can deliver point solutions, but it can’t work across silos, surface information from multiple sources or turn small gains into measurable impact at scale. Every interaction becomes a separate integration challenge, perpetuating the same fragmentation problem councils already know too well.
Around two-thirds of the councils can’t consistently measure whether AI is delivering results. While that might seem like a measurement failure, it’s actually an architecture one. When the systems underneath aren’t connected, there’s nothing to measure against.
The foundation before the future
Foundation first is the design principle behind Datascape. A connected, modular platform where each capability shares a common foundation across property, rating, regulatory, customer and asset operations. AI is embedded in the platform, working natively across functions, meaning gains are measurable and value compounds over time.
Hauraki started with a connected foundation they could build on at their own pace. Now, every new capability they add reaches further because of what’s already there. The councils furthest along on AI share that same pattern: starting with the system underneath and allowing results to follow.
Datacom’s full 2025 local government AI insights report maps where councils sit on the maturity curve, what’s holding them back and what the councils building real momentum have in common. For couhncils making decisions about where to invest next, the system underneath is the best place to start.
