MAYOR GARCETTI ANNOUNCES LA RANKED #1 IN US CITY OPEN DATA CENSUS
Just one year after Mayor Garcetti launched LA’s first-ever Open Data Portal
LA given ISO 3721 Platinum Certification for Data by World Council on City Data
LOS ANGELES– Mayor Garcetti today announced the Los Angeles has been ranked #1 by the US City Open Data Census for its open data. The Census, administered by Code for America, the Sunlight Foundation, and the Open Knowledge Foundation– leaders in open data and transparency–ranks cities’ data on the availability, quality, and accessibility of its open data. Just one year after Mayor Garcetti launched the City’s first-ever open data portal, LA tops the list, beating New York, San Francisco, Boston, and Philadelphia.
Mayor Garcetti also announced that LA has received platinum status for its open data from the World Council on City Data (WCCD), the certification body responsible for implementing the first international standard for cites, ISO 37120: Sustainable development of communities — Indicators for city services and quality of life. With 100 indicators, based on 17 themes, ISO 37120 certifies the quality and availability of city data, ensuring a global standard for data which enables comparability and best practice sharing for cities around the world through the WCCD Open City Data Portal.
“Our number one ranking on the US City Open Data Census and our WCCD platinum status prove that LA is leading the nation– and the globe– in best practices in making our city data open, accessible, and useful for Angelenos, organizations, and leaders around the world,” said Mayor Eric Garcetti. “But this isn’t just good data for data’s sake– I’m invested in harnessing the power of our open data to make city hall run better, provide better services to Angelenos, and improve quality of life here in LA.”
“Los Angeles is leading the way in defining what it means to be a world-class digital city. In just under a year, the city has launched and developed its data program, leading to over 300 open data sets and now a #1 ranking for US Cities,” said Mayor Garcetti’s Chief Data Officer, Abhi Nemani. “But in the end, it’s not how much data you put out, it’s how you put that data to work. Now with the launch of the WCCD Standard and Open City Data Portal, we have a new tool at our disposal for data-driven decision-making, and can closely assess how those decisions affect the quality of life for all Angelenos.”
“Under the leadership of Mayor Garcetti, Los Angeles has become a shining example of the importance of city data in planning for sustainability, resiliency, transparency and inclusive prosperity,” said WCCD President and CEO, Dr. Patricia McCarney.
“The WCCD is very pleased to welcome Los Angeles as a WCCD ISO 37120 Platinum certified city, and I look forward to working with Mayor Garcetti as a member of the WCCD Global City Leaders Advisory Board,” said Senator Art Eggleton, Chair of the WCCD Global City Leaders Advisory Board and former Mayor of Toronto.
Today’s announcement comes on the heels of a data sharing agreement between the City of Los Angeles, the traffic app Waze, and Google to put LA’s open data, including planned road closures and city events, to work to help Angelenos cut commute times and make it easier to navigate the city. Waze will also work with the Los Angeles Police Department to broadcast AMBER Alerts and hit and run notifications to the more than 1.3 million Waze users around LA.
Last year, Los Angeles was ranked #1 for cities with populations of 250,000 or more in the 2014 Digital Cities Survey, conducted by e.Republic’s Center for Digital Government.
Los Angeles’ open data initiative began with Mayor Eric Garcetti’s third executive directive issued on December 18th, 2013. The directive states: “To promote transparency and accountability, the City of Los Angeles (“City”) will make publicly available raw data in easy-to-find and accessible formats. Open Data is raw data generated or collected by government agencies made freely available for use by the public, subject only to valid privacy, confidentiality, security, and other legal restrictions.” Since the launch of the open data initiative, Los Angeles has published over 300 data sets, all available on https://data.lacity.org/.
About the US City Open Data Census
The US City Open Data Census is an ongoing, crowdsourced measure of the current state of access to a selected group of datasets in municipalities across the United States. Any community member contribute an assessment of these datasets in their municipality at any time. Census content will be peer-reviewed periodically by a volunteer team of Open Data Census Librarians led by the Code for America Brigade and the Sunlight Foundation. For more information about the US City Open Data Census, visit: http://us-city.census.okfn.org/
About the WCCD
The World Council on City Data (WCCD) coordinates all efforts on open city data to ensure a consistent and comprehensive platform for standardized urban metrics. As a global leader on standardized indicators, the WCCD is also leading the efforts on global implementation of ISO 37120 – the first international standard on sustainable cities. For more information, visit: http://www.dataforcities.org/
