slides from initiative introductory session

1. What Works Cities Initiative
Sunlight Foundation

2. The Sunlight Foundation works to make
government transparent and accountable.
Improving local open data – through better policy
and access –helps us all move toward that goal.

3. Open Data =
the right to information online
Administratively Technically
Proactively Online Open formats
Cost-free Machine-readable
License-free Bulk downloads

4. Why Open Data?
Rockefeller Institute, Jan 2015
To add capacity.
Private employers have
recovered from recession -
but state and local gov’t
employment still below
recession levels.

5. http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/04/21/open-government-data/
Why Open Data?
To provide the public
information people want.
2015 Pew Study:
• 76% of people go online to
interact with government
• The majority of those people
are seeking information

6. Why Open
Data?
To work with partners.
Existing organizations
across the country help
maximize the value we
can get from government
data.

7. Why open data?
To benefit internal users.
Better awareness: data inventories reveal new data holdings
Better access: shared data portal makes data-sharing seamless
Better evaluation: more data on wider variety of program outcomes
Better data: more eyes on data – additional quality check

8. What are governments and communities
doing with it?
• Improving service targeting
• Increasing innovation
• Improving public communication
How?

9. Publicly exploring problems
Code for DC
San Francisco - Evictions
Baltimore Neighborhood Indicators

10. Making better decisions
DataKind: Optimal NY tree pruning
Data Science for Social Good:
Relating Chicago’s crime and and broken street lights

11. Improving access to public service

12. Communicating Out
Chicago’s Scofflaw Landlords Map California’s Healthcare Acquired Infections Map

13. Bringing New Information In

14. Increasing Participation

15. Why create an open data policy?
Policy maximizes potential.
Better structure: clarifies internal responsibilities and creates structure
Better accountability: creates accountability for data quality
Better sustainability: ensures sustained commitment
Better participation: creates a regular, official space for public participation

16. Open Data Policies June 2015

17. WWC policy approach
• Model executive order/ordinance
• High level policy commits to:
• Moving city toward broad, proactive data release
• Assigning roles and responsibilities
• Publishing data to a central portal
• Regular review of progress on publication goals
• Supported with additional, targeted resources to maximize
policy quality and local value

18. Specific suggested tasks in the policy
• Appoint agency data coordinators
• Conduct a data inventory
• Develop a review process for potentially sensitive data
• Develop a prioritization process for open data release
• Develop a publication process to ensure high-quality data
• Create a public timeline for new dataset publication
• Ensure that published datasets are available for bulk download
• Create opportunities to collaborate with the public