Tag: government 2.0

The Leaders of California’s Most Tech-Friendly Cities Say Governments Need to Do These Three Things

Posted on by robbie

It takes more than just technology to join the government 2.0 movement that’s swept the country over the past few years. Beyond big data, it takes vision and leadership to create governmental strategies that will better serve communities through a multitude of tech-driven solutions.
Discussing those tools and policies at the California Leadership Forum last week were a panel of some of the state’s public-sector innovation leaders. Highlighting some of their discussion, here are three strategies to keep in mind as more municipalities take on the task of creating a more transparent and efficient government:
Foster a cultural change in the workplace.
Encouraging employees to experiment with new ideas while at work is essential in shifting government out of antiquated practices, according to Lea Deesing, chief innovation officer of Riverside, Calif. That task is a job belonging to the new mainstay in local governments: chief innovation officers.

Jeremy Goldberg, deputy chief of staff for San Jose, Calif. Mayor Chuck Reed and head of the city’s civic innovation efforts, agrees, adding that recognizing “internal champions” who can coordinate projects with third parties in short periods of time also helps.

Engage citizens to help spur ideas.
Rather than simply highlighting success stories, officials need to focus on what changes need to happen to continue fostering a more innovative environment, according to Robert White, chief innovation officer of Davis, Calif.

“I would love to see at the state level, some kind of recognition or awarding of folks who in their daily jobs, are just changing the way we think about delivering government services,” he says. “That would be a very meaningful way to get others to be engaged and see these best practices and opportunities.”

Emphasizing an open environment and inviting residents to share ideas on a technical level is another strategy to generate more local participation, Deesing adds. One example? Riverside’s transparency portal, Engage Riverside, links to the community share tool MindMixer, which prompted a program for free computer training for low-income families.
Keep a focus on cybersecurity. 
With more transparency and big data comes the concern about privacy. As governments continue to utilize data and develop online community tools, protecting it is paramount.

“It’s fun to talk about all the great things we’re about to do with technology, but if we’re not protecting our current assets, our department of justice data, our police data, our fire data, if we’re not doing that, I think we’re doing a disservice,” Deesing says.

MORE: 5 Ways to Strengthen Ties Between Cops and Citizens

Which States Are Tops in the Open Data Movement?

Posted on by robbie

As more local municipalities join the open data movement, the Center for Data Innovation, a think tank, has assessed which state governments are actually measuring up with the best policies.
A new report ranks states based on progress with open data policies and digital accessibility to data portals. Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, New York, Oklahoma and Utah are the top six states, respectively, in making strides with the open data movement.
The report also finds that 10 states currently maintain open data policies, and all but one offer an open-data portal. (New Hampshire being the exception as the only state with an open-data policy that doesn’t offer complete datasets.) Over the last two years, five states have created new policies while four have amended existing ones. Overall, 24 states offer some form of an open data portal, including some without policies in place.
The rankings were determined based on four categories including the presence of an open-data policy, the quality of the policy, the presence of a open-data portal and the quality of that portal, according to Government Executive.
The report also explores common elements among those states with the most successful open data campaigns, including data being open by default — which includes public, expenditure and legislative records — as well as being released in a non-proprietary format or a machine readable format. A universal format is important in order for nonprofits, businesses and other users to process and translate the datasets. For example, if a state releases data in a PDF or DOC, it may not be considered effective because the format is not machine-readable.
While some states have polices on government transparency, the report points out that often that translates to publishing data on only a few topics, which is a good starting point, but not comprehensive enough.

“While a general transparency portal is a good start, open data portals can help increase transparency and accountability by opening up all government data, non just certain types of records,” the report says.

MORE: To Increase Government Transparency, San Diego Joins the Open Data Movement

The 7 Smartest Uses of Technology in Government Today

Posted on by robbie

Ahead of our July 30 lunch with Rachel Haot, we’re surveying the best applications of new technology in government across the country. Click here to write Rachel a question or idea, and we’ll pose it to her.

  • ShotSpotter

This Milwaukee-based program relies on microphones in public places to instantly identify a gunshot by its sound signature. One thing this technology helps to prevent is false alarms: sometimes people confuse fireworks or tires going flat with gunfire. But more importantly, it notifies the authorities to actual gunshots, since in the vast majority of cases residents do not report them — even when they clearly identify the noise as such. In Milwaukee, one city that’s found success in ShotSpotter, only 14 percent of residents dialed 911 upon hearing gunshots. This is partly out of fear of retribution, but also a tragedy of the commons problem. ShotSpotter is now live in 75 American cities, including Washington, D.C. and most recently, New York City.

  • NYC OpenData Portal

After Rachel Haot wrote the era-defining Digital Roadmap for NYC in Spring 2011, the city followed up on her instruction to make as much data open to the public as possible. Since then, New York City has published more than a thousand datasets on the usual topics like education, health, transportation and crime. This is an inherently transparent move: more of what the government knows about itself is now available to its citizens. Even better, it’s also proven to be a good first step in government-citizen collaboration. Some amazing visualizations have been derived from the data, including the Breathing City and the Collisions by Time of Day map:

  • Grade.DC

Our nation’s capital is on the vanguard of discerning public opinion through digital interaction. Check out grade.DC.Gov: through it, any Washington, D.C. resident can grade any aspect of the city’s service. Every day, the mayor and his staff receive an analysis of the feedback, so they can focus their efforts on what citizens need most at that moment. They can also geo-target the responses, enabling them reallocate resources by district. In June they averaged an A-. Not bad.

  • Predictive Policing (PredPol)

We know what you’re thinking: Minority Report. Yeah, kind of. This California program uses data to allocate policing resources to areas where criminal acts are more likely to occur. Its advantage lies in its bigger-picture comprehension of crime. Instead of issuing a blanket designation that certain areas are heavily problematic, PredPol analyzes each individual crime against a history of similar transgressions from the past, to calculate an array of probabilities. When the LAPD ran the program against its own internal data processing, PredPol was twice as good at predicting where wrongdoings would occur. Founded by a mathematician from Santa Clara University, the system incorporates some of the techniques that geologists use to predict earthquake aftershocks.

  • Diplopedia

The State Department has this well-named internal wiki where diplomats and their staffers share vital but sensitive information about all kinds of things. The rules and principles are very similar to Wikipedia’s, including the requirement to adopt a neutral point of view, cite professional sources, and defer to others. It’s almost two years old and a model of intra-government collaboration and information sharing.

  • FastFWD

This program is like Code for America, but for infrastructure. Run out of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, FastFWD pairs entrepreneurs with local governments to solve civic engineers’ and public officials’ infrastructure problems. Their goal is to push projects through the pipeline much faster, more affordably and with greater impact. Its first class of entrepreneurs graduated this summer.

  • Smarter Sustainable Dubuque

Dubuque is a town of 58,000 on the eastern border of Iowa. In 2009, it partnered with IBM to install smart water meters — which flag overuse and monitor leaks — in 300 homes. During the program’s first year, participating residents used almost 7 percent less water.
Sources: Digital Transformation: Wiring the Responsive City; WhiteHouse.gov; StateTech Magazine