Open Government and local community foundations: Getting involved

What is Open Government And how can it work with your community foundation? November 14, 2013

Susan Mernit Knight Circuit Rider, Oakland Local Editor/Publisher

1 All rights reserved. susanmernit.com

WHAT WE’RE TALKING ABOUT

What is Open Government and what opportuni4es does it offer for you as a community founda4on?

This webinar will: • Talk about how partnerships between technologists and city, county, state and federal governments can result in greater transparency and accountability, more access to data for ci=zens, and even cost-‐savings • Share case studies where community founda=ons have go@en involved • Show you resources to use to get started

2 All rights reserved. susanmernit.com

All rights reserved. susanmernit.com 3

Welcome to Northern California! This region is a center for open government & open data projects-‐-‐

• San Francisco has the first Chief InnovaOon Officer in the country—who launched SF as an open data city

• Oakland passed a resoluOon to support data transparency in ALL content

• Code for America was founded here, MapLight is here—and GovFresh was also started in the Bay

And of course, we like to #hack like crazy..because there are so many programmers


But open government projects are happening all over the country, with some amazing ones in:

• Chicago, IL • New Orleans, LA • New York, New York • Washington, DC

Questions to check in on before we go farther: • What is open data and open government exactly? • What’s the benefit to my organization & my community to get involved?


“Transparency promotes accountability and provides informa4on for ci4zens about what their Government is doing.” -‐-‐White House


We’re talking a

“Open data is data that can be freely used, reused and redistributed by anyone – subject only, at most, to the requirement to a@ribute and sharealike.”-‐-‐OpenDefini=on.org

The US Government has more than 40,000 datasets available at data.gov, and just about every state has a data repository now. Local coun=es, big ci=es and even smaller ci=es are also geTng involved.


Hashtags to watch for: #opengov, #opendata, #gov2.0 Related: #citycamp #github #tbarcamp


Open government projects often pair city officials with highly skilled volunteers and other community members to solve problems in ways government could not on their own.

Example 1: Open Budget Oakland Read & understand the $1B Oakland city budget http://openbudgetoakland.org/

Who was involved? City of Oakland, Code for America, Open Oakland brigade volunteers, East Bay Economic Development Association

Created at a hackathon, supported at a co-‐working space, built with City data by volunteers from a @codeforamerica brigade with info shared on data.openoakland.org, data.oaklandnet.com, and GitHub at github.com/openoakland


Example 2: How’s Business Chicago from Open City Apps

http://howsbusinesschicago.org/

This is one of several apps built by a very skilled volunteer team using city data. OpenCityApps.org hosts a weekly Open Gov hack night and creates free, Open source projects that others can implement elsewhere.


Other projects from Open City Apps include http://opencityapps.org/

Chicago Councilmatic: Interactive App showing what legislation the City Council has been passing

CAPSure: Alerts for community police Meetings

2nd City Zoning: Guide to your neighborhood from a planning perspective

And many more!

IMPACT: HUGE. High usage of some apps, big press awareness, lots of momentum.


Discussion break: What kind of apps would you like to see your community build if you had access to the data and people with the skills? What projects is your founda=on working on where an open-‐source app could really have impact if it was widely used?


Community Foundations in some cities have already gotten involved.

Hawaii Community Foundation and Open Data Hawaii worked together this fall To encourage ALL candidates running For Mayor to sign a pledge to vow to make Honolulu City Government transparent and to follow the practices of open government.

The candidates all signed—and Open Data Hawaii says they are working with the CF to “push these ini=a=ves forward, changing policy and crea=ng opportuni=es for tomorrow’s ci=zens and entrepreneurs.”


In Oregon, the Meyer Memorial Trust, Oregon’s largest community foundation, built a new platform to connect engage citizens with policy & non-profits

For Oregon Unlimited, launched March 2013, the MMT leased a placorm that allows complete connec=vity, community and discussion of civic projects.

They use it as both an economic development engine and a community connector. h@ps://www.oregonunlimited.org


Oregon Unlimited is a follow up to Ideas4Oregon, a 2010 contest for a “million dollar” idea that got more than 200 entries and promised to spend up to $1MM to bring the best one to life.

That project was built on top of another commercial platform called UserVoice; they open sourced the ideas so everyone could see them (just like Knight Foundation often does with their competitions.)

www.ideas4oregon.org/


Building a transparent process with local government & community

In South Wood County MI, the local community foundation, IncourageCF, purchased the now-shuttered newspaper building and is conducting a community-outreach process around what to do with it.

They’re conducting meetings, and documenting the process online, as part of a bigger program of creating cultural change in their community to spark innovation and economic development.

http://www.tribunebuilding.org/


“Managing a resident-‐centered, resident-‐led design process entrusts decision-‐making to the community and invites everyone to par4cipate. It requires more 4me, effort and resources than unilateral decision-‐making.

We’re asking community members to determine its end use. “—InCourageCF CEO

So, what’s the takeaway?


How do civic engagement processes, open data, open government and your mission in your city fit together?

Where do you see risks & challenges?

How would you/will you address them?

Discussion


The latest Knight Community Information Challenge funded 10 civic engagement/open government projects that eeach involve a CF

(see Foundations strengthen local journalism, open government - Knight Foundation http://kng.ht/1aNPZgS)

Cities include Lexington, KY, Chattanooga, TN, Gary, IN, Boston, MA, New Orleans, LA, and others.

Dreaming of local data……


How to get involved (go ahead, jump in!)

Attend a civic engagement meet-up, a Bar Camp, or a Brigade meeting in your town and meet folks.

Talk to your city’s IT department and lead officials about making data available in usable forms


Tech resources:

Github: Open Source Code Repository

Socrata.com: Commercial database for local government

Granicus: Soeware for city government

Data.gov: 40K federal data sets

OpenGov.org: Resource for open data at state and local levels

ParOcipatorypoliOcs.org: Building open source tools for open government


Resources NATIONAL Sunlight Foundation, http://sunlightfoundation.com/ Broadly focused, national non-profit focused on supporting every aspect of government transparency.

Code for America, http://codeforamerica.org The “peace core” for open government tech, having a huge impact through fellows’ programs, support for city government projects, and volunteer brigades.

City Camp: http://citycamp.govfresh.com/ How to start a City Camp and how to affiliate.


Resources National Network Indicators Project, http://www.neighborhoodindicators.org/ Long-established network of data-driven non-profits using local data and analytics for policy planning and program development.

Open Knowledge Foundation, http://okfn.org/ EU-based global resource for supporting in-country open data, open source & transparency.

Open Government stories on GitHub, http://government.github.com/ Space to share and read stories about #opengov and #open data projects

Followup

– Reach Susan: [email protected]

– See MORE resources on my Pinterest board: h@p://www.pinterest.com/susanmernit/open-‐government-‐and-‐community-‐founda=ons-‐board-‐fo/

– Other Mernit presos:h@p://slideshare.com/susanmernit

– See this presenta=on and download at the KDMC site: h@p://www.knightdigitalmediacenter.org


Education

Open Government and local community foundations: Getting involved