Since GIS is still an emerging technology, five GIS experts would likely provide you with five very different definitions. For local government, GIS might be summarized in the following way: GIS brings geographic data from surveys, plats, spreadsheets, GPS units and paper files together within a computer network that is available to employees, officials and citizens for the generation of visual maps and reports; for tracking permits, fees and licenses; and for modeling, projecting and analyzing geographic data trends.
You may download the following brochure for more information:
An Introduction: Municipal Geographic Information Systems (85K)