SF reboots open data efforts

[caption id=”attachment_16230” align=”alignnone” width=”700”] Port of San Francisco (Photo: Luke Fretwell)[/caption]

It took a while for San Francisco to get a serious open data effort off the ground, but now that new chief data officer Joy Bonaguro has had some time to take lay of the land, she’s ready to roll.

“I’ve been spending a lot of time getting to know people working both inside and outside of the City (or in partnership),” writes Bonaguro in her first blog post as CDO. “Along the way, I’ve been learning a lot about our challenges with data use and access, but I’ve also learned a great deal about some amazing work.”

Bonaguro will soon publish the city’s three-year strategic plan, but you can get a preview from her recent presentation to the city’s Committee on Information Technology.

Part of the next phase of SF open data includes a much-needed overhaul of the city’s data platform, DataSF, the heavy bureaucratic lift of consensus-building and collaboration and working with the local civic hacker community to re-purpose the data in creative ways.

For those who want to give feedback on the current platform, there’s a survey for that.

I recently had the opportunity to meet and talk with Bonaguro, and it’s refreshing to see someone with so much energy working in this role who is genuinely focused on a long-term commitment to the job, building a sustainable internal data movement and collaborating closely with key stakeholders.

Her user design/experience background will also redefine and expand a role that has traditionally been limited to more of developer mindset. Given that the former is accustomed to collaborating on mutually-agreed solutions, this should play well in building consensus and expediting the city’s next phase in open data.

Follow DataSF updates on Twitter at @DataSF and at the new blog, DataSF Speaks.