What Happened?
Lincoln, Nebraska, has started posting inspections of the city’s 1,200 food service businesses on its website. Citizens can search inspection records for the prior three years to determine if a business recorded any violations.
Who Cares?
Like several other cities and counties, including New York City, Camden County, N.J. and Franklin County, Ohio, Lincoln health officials hope to reduce the number of food-borne illnesses each year. By putting the data online, these locales want citizens to choose dining establishments with a record of cleanliness in food preparation.
Making data like this available online is not a new phenomenon. As Gov1 has covered previously, hundreds of cities like Palo Alto, San Francisco and Seattle are providing citizens with open data ranging from the location of public toilets to street-specific crime statistics to the location of graffiti and road closures.
What Happens to the Data?
In today’s technology-inundated landscape, the data often gets compiled into user-friendly mobile apps. Developers have found a new niche for mobile apps created with data supplied by cities and counties. For example, Diner Inspect, an app that uses data from the city of Ottawa, Canada, creates a map of restaurant health code violations in proximity to an address you enter.
Another nifty app is Crime Reports which shows crime data for several U.S. and Canadian cities on an interactive map. Data can be sorted by type and date. Other apps help users find the location of transit buses, metro trains, parking spaces, public art and specific types of trees.
Can it Be Replicated?
Yes, cities have been successfully making various types of data sets available to the public for years. Consulting with in-house or third-party information technology experts is the best place to start. Municipalities might also find it useful to poll citizens about the types of data to which they would like to have easy access.
Several groups are also available to help with open data efforts. Two New York University professors put together a short guide to Getting Started with Open Data. The group We Love Open Data also compiles tons of resources for cities heading down this path. The Open Knowledge Foundation is a non-profit that works to promote open data around the world.
Funding Resources
Digital Government Society of North America: This site offers networking opportunities, resources and information about the National Science Foundation’s ‘Digital Government’ grant process is available. The grant will provide an anticipated $8 million for “Digital Government” academic/government collaborations to contribute to government strategic planning for information technologies and services.
Technology Grant News: A subscription service that indexes grants available to cities for technology-related initiatives.
The Empowered Municipality: A compilation of grants available to cities for various purposes.