Public-Private Data Sharing Initiatives that Improve I&R for Everyone

Public-Private Data Sharing Initiatives that Improve I&R for Everyone

John Pierce, PhD., JD, Deputy Director, Allegheny County Dept. of Human Services

Josh Knauer, CEO, Rhiza Labs (Formerly of MAYA Design)

Allegheny County Overview

Includes City of Pittsburgh and 129 other municipalities

• Population: 1,281,666

• Families below poverty level: 7.9%

• Median family income: $49,815

• Population served by Dept of Public Welfare: 6.5%

Allegheny County Department of Human Services

The Department of Human Services (DHS) is a multi-service agency that resulted from combining six independent county departments in 1997.

Current Offices:

• Area Agency on Aging• Behavioral Health

• Children, Youth and Families

• Community Services• Mental Retardation/Developmental Disabilities

DHS serves more than 200,000 residents annually

DHS values consumer choice

DHS contracts with more than 400 community organizations

These agencies provide multiple services at more than 5000 locations

Allegheny County Department of Human Services

Information about resources needed to be united from many scattered databases

Consumers and their families needed access to resource information if they were going to exercise choice

Helping professionals, policy makers and funders also needed access to these resources

The community needed an integrated information resource that accurately reflected the state of community resources and services

This resource needed to be comprehensive but user friendly and available to all residents of Allegheny County in real time

The Need

15 local foundations form the Human Services Integration Fund to support data integration activities

Rhiza Labs led representatives of the broader community in structured design sessions. Participants included:

• Providers• Advocacy Organizations• Academic Community• Funding Community• Government Agencies

The Community Responds…

Uniting community data from multiple sources

Import data from any format to Info Commons

Data flows to any application

Community manages its own data, changes flow to all

New Jersey 211

Problem:• Nine call centers throughout state• Used nine different IRis (Foxpro) installs• No easy way to synchronize data• Wanted to integrate data from other

agencies in NJ

Information Commons in other communities

Information Commons Solution:• All call centers have exact same data• Distributed editing/updates supported• Much easier integration w/other agencies

Demonstration

http://www.humanservices.nethttp://www.uwac.org

http://nj211.maya.comhttp://databasin.org

Issues to consider in your community

4 Key Areas to Address:

• Governance -- local buy-in is critical• Funders -- foundation community can be a catalyst• Political Issues -- meeting everyone’s needs• Technical Issues -- flexible, open platform required

Issues to consider in your community

Governance:

• Local buy-in is critical• Grassroots initiatives are more successful• Start small - don’t try to broker super-agreements• Involve community based organizations from the beginning

Funders:

• Foundation community derives benefits from data sharing• Better access to data helps foundations make more informed

funding decisions• Effective I&R helps agencies serve more people in need• Can be catalysts for participation by requiring data sharing as

contingency for funding• If data is useful beyond I&R purposes, more opportunities

available for funding

Issues to consider in your community

Political Issues:

• Organizations want to control their own data• Credit where credit is due is important• Organizations want to control how data is presented (e.g.

taxonomies, website layout, search methodology)• AIRS compliance important to some, but not all• Bottom line: flexibility is essential

Issues to consider in your community

Technical Issues:

• Flexible, open platform is needed• Distributed data management key• Ability to support multiple taxonomies very important• APIs give organizations freedom to integrate community data

into their own systems and websites

Issues to consider in your community

Results across the community

Career Development for Youth

Benefits of the Information Commons Approach

A way to unify community information • Innovative database platform • Mission critical information and referral asset

A better understanding of the forces affecting our children, families and neighborhoods

A data-driven foundation for planning and analysis • Get the “right information to the right people at the right time” • Best return on our community investments

For more information:

John Pierce, PhD., JD, Deputy Director, Allegheny County Dept. of Human Services

(412) 350-5860john.pierce@dhs.county.allegheny.pa.us

www.alleghenycounty.us/dhs

Josh KnauerCEO, Rhiza Labs(412) 488-2900

knauer@rhizalabs.comwww.rhizalabs.com