San Francisco Mayor Edwin Lee and Board of Supervisors President David Chiu today announced new legislation that will strengthen San Francisco’s Open Data Initiative. The legislation includes the creation of a new chief data officer position to encourage using data sources to make government services more efficient.
The position, for which the city is currently recruiting, will work in the mayor’s budget office to oversee a city-wide effort among open data coordinators across various departments.
Lee also encouraged private sector companies with access to large amounts of data to allow open access in order to improve government services.
"If there’s a way that their data can come to us, it might very well be the grounds for better public service for all of our different departments, whether we’re talking about health or sports or all kinds of things that our public will use," Lee said today at a press conference streamed live on the Internet.
The mayor also announced a new Recreation and Parks Department mobile app, developed by local firm Appallicious, that includes mapping information for the city’s local parks.
Additionally, a new collaboration was announced between the city government with the private company Motionloft, an analytics company that will contribute some of their datasets to San Francisco’s Open Data portal, DataSF. According to a press release from the Mayor’s office, Motionloft is the first private company to partner with the city to make city-related data available to the public.
"It’s important to keep on pushing for datasets that can allow us to work on the imperfections in city government, to figure out where it is we need to take risks, where we can be more entrepreneurial, where we can be more transparent, and frankly more accountable to all of you," Chiu said today.
The city’s Open Data Initiative dates back to 2009 when then Mayor Gavin Newsom directed city departments to make all non-confidential datasets available on DataSF.org.
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