Live blogging session #5: How to create smarter cities from the bottom up

SESSION #5 THEME: If Only We Knew…how to create smarter cities from the bottom up

• CHANGE AGENT: Michael P. Flowers, Chief Analytics Officer, New York City Government
• FACILITATOR: Steve Koonin, Steven E. Koonin was appointed as the founding Director of NYU’s Center for Urban Science and Progress

The following is a liveblog of one of six sessions at The GovLab Experiment: Making Engagement Work. It will be updated as the sessions progress from 10:00 AM – 3:00 PM. For the full schedule, please see: http://thegovlab.org/events/making-engagement-work/. For more, read the session description at the bottom of the post.
(Live blogging updates provided by N.Y.U. student Christina Rogawksi)
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3:29 PM: Goal: mash up personal data with civic data in private vault. Then, citizens can decide what and where they to share with via an interactive map, including social features integrated with advocacy networks. We want citizen engagement beyond tweeting #311 to government.

Let’s incorporate social networking: connect with neighbors, create communitiy, leverage existing connections, and tap into advocacy neworks.

Consider participatory budgeting – how does the city want to spend their slice of the pie? We need to give everyone a voice, including those who aren’t tech-savvy, in order to be truly democratic.

Challenge: How can we hear everyone without creating so much noise that you don’t hear anyone?

Long debate: how does government open engagement and participation, but keep it organized? In trying to make sense of the noise, it’s difficult to avoid a path of pushing agendas on citizens, which returns to bureaucracy and organizations stifling voices.

2:33 PM: What’s a noncontroversial data set to launch a Data Vault? Maybe we need to start there and roll out to other areas after gaining insights. Example: quantifying commutes (how much time do you spend traveling, on gas, on different roads, etc.)–data citizens might find useful, but also data valuable to government (traffic flow, road conditions, energy use.)

Design idea:  City puts in what the city knows about you, aggregates it into a shared, interactive heat map (data anonymous), with problem-solving feedback loop. Individuals can also access their own data stream in the heat map (data vault) which is personalized, private to citizen, and citizen determines how much and at what level of anonymity they will share.

Where we’re going: developing a new infrastructure in which individuals contribute passive and active data, integrate with other data sources to create both 1) Heat Map/Feedback Loop and 2) Private Data Vault

To achieve this ask: how to build in more social components to really connect with neighbors in meaningful ways, put data in context, and collaborate with government and neighbors? Would want the ability to organize data according to issue, which will enhance/inform the advocacy networks.

2:25 PM: We’re not expecting to ask government for permission in order for things to work. This advocacy network or platform should be so powerful and robust that government can no longer ignore it. Maybe the government should turn to the public advocacy network not only to pull in information, but to push out information, like press releases today. We need more direct collaboration – bring it back to the Feedback Loop.

Question arises again: do we simply link existing platforms, and partner with private companies like Google and Apple? Or, do we need to build a new one? Think of it like an interstate highway network: a stream of data that government wants/needs, and people can “get on” (opt-in or opt-out) at various points, according to issues they care about. For example, parents will opt-in to sharing education-related data with schools. The highways lead to a Data Vault, which citizens can access to see (only their) personal data.

2:15 PM: The first thing about knowing the city is knowing yourself: how do you fit in, how do you compare to your neighbors, and what does that say about the entire neighborhood?

Do citizens want to do this comparison? Yes – if I can’t pay my bills, I want to know if my neighbors are having the same problem.

Problem: some people don’t own all their data. How do I get my own data, and then decide if I want to share it with the government?

Idea: Data should be automatically shared with citizens, who can then opt-in (or perhaps default opt-in, allow opt-out?)  to more automatically share data (according to their issue/concern) with the government.

Difficult for cities to set standards on data sharing – this may need to be regulated by federal government. A good example: national financial reforms requiring more transparency from financial institutions. Need the same push in other industries such as healthcare.

2:10 PM: What are the drivers for participation? We’re assuming an implicit desire to participate. Understanding this is a challenge as well as growing who wants to engage. What if the already super engaged dont want to move online? How do we integrate them into tech-fueled citizen engagement? Example: meetup platform to combine both online/offline experiences

Government should facilitate “fingerprinting”: matching advocates with issues they care about. Would then also be creating new advocates who use these new tools. Conflict between old and new advocates may be part of the process.

Do current advocates use data? Not much yet. Government currently provides data but it’s not connected to any schema or context, so people dont really use it, don’t understand it. Advocates and government need to meet in the middle, with contextualized data

1:55 PM: Revisiting the session question: How can we create an engaged, urban-bottom up, smarter cities movement? Group sees this as citizens being empowered with new tools of data collection (biometrics, taxes, potholes, etc.). Challenge isn’t simply bringing this data to government agencies, but integrating it with other data, on different levels (i.e. health indicators by neighborhood)

How can we aggregate citizen voices and connect them to trusted organizations within their neighborhoods, with these organizations serving as advocates for their communities AND being tied to government agencies that can provide solutions? We need a network to connect these organizations, governments and citizens.

How can we make government BETTER LISTENERS? Make sure topics arise organically, not trying to force a schema onto its citizens. We need to formalize a way to Validate Credentials of citizens—example: Localocracy. Requires authentication in order to participate, submit reports.

12:22 PM: Let’s focus more on a “solution app” than a “problem app”: let’s ask citizens what THEY want done, rather than asking them to help government with what it wants. Example: Change By Us.

We have not done a good enough job of creating partnerships for a We the Government approach, a true We the City collaboration.

Idea for design: Create a real-time interactive data map, open to citizens, and integrated with a public advocacy network to collect data, show progress on citizen-submitted reports, provide feedback loops and a sense of community. Caveat: maintain privacy. We can show the number of gun-owners, but not anyone’s address. Counterpoint: citizens may claim the right to know how many gun owners, how many crimes in their neighborhood.

Design unit: neighborhood is too diluted. Focus on street intersection boundaries to create segments (even segment ID by block.) Incorporate heat maps for different serivces (e.g. bus routes, gas stations open during emergency)

User experience: “Star” places I care about (home, work, leisure.)

What about participatory budgeting? How can we integrate that into the design (looking beyond “the pothole”)

Look to the app Checkpoint 2.0: lets citizens see every single check the city writes, including data visualizations and information on contracts. Open-source. Ultimately, everything has to be USEFUL.

12:15 PM Gamification of citizen participation: what about giving badges, points for community leaders? Create “to-do”lists that would help government, such as photographing fallen trees or recording noise pollution.

People don’t become public advocates to be rewarded, but we should still reward public advocates. There may be “silent public advocates” who feel their voices would not go anywhere, and so do not participate. Again, this comes back to community and a sense of belonging, and real feedback.

12:05 PM: What about citizens closing the 311 request after it is completed? What about citizens who have solutions to these problems? Perhaps we crowdsource not only the problem-reporting, but problem-solving.

Government can then identify who the public advocates are, creating a “citizen mayor” to do the intermediation. Maybe this will help reach underserved communities – maybe the community development organization can serve as the voice of that community and engage with government more directly.Government should expand upon these existing civic infrastructures, letting collaboration with government grow more organically, authentically. Look at STREETCRED.

11:57 AM: Why does the governments view of the city differ from citizens’ view of the city? The “trust map” should also be open to citizens, so everyone can collaborate. We then can try to gamify and reward behaviors in the trust map/feedback loop – Perhaps prioritize issues that come through desired social media platforms? Another major challenge: verifying the accuracy of reports! Some say only 10% accuracy of building violation reports. Is there a way to leverage existing platforms to solve this problem? Also, is there a way to get underserved communities involved? We’re dealing with an artificial slice of the world and need to help those that don’t currently have a voice in government.
11:52 AM: Idea offered: What about building a “trust map” similar to CompStat, in which cities can monitor, target, and address areas of trust? A problem raised: How would you even develop metrics for that? How many participate in civic activities? How many members of a specific club?  There have been experiments: a UK city monitored calls for a month and, based on that information, researchers could determine multiple socioeconomic datasets. The idea would be to lot where/when/how citizens helped solve a problem on the map

11:47 AM: Instead of building a new platform, can government focus on leveraging existing platforms, such as Twitter or Fourquare, to build real-time monitoring and data gathering? In such platforms, citizens already opt-in, and there are APIs for easier customization.

Privacy issues are still a concern, but government should also work with these companies to build partnerships. Leverage the equity of these companies to transfer that trust, visibility, and engagement into government engagement. Trust and visibility have to come before engagement.

11:46AM: There is a need for people to have a sense of contact and trust. Citizens need to have a sense of audience but as they don’t trust the government there is no sense of audience. We should not look for just efficient government-citizens relationships but more complex network of citizens. in other words creating trust vertically and laterally. Is this effective and efficient? What are the elements of trust and how do we use In other words – to look at future and not immediate matters? Level of trust may be different across geographies can we build real time data that can accumulate to  become a trust map tool.
11:40 AM: We should look beyond “potholes” – What are the biggest problems? Some cities have problems with connectivity.

Most citizen reports so far focus on a small neighborhood radius. Whatever we build needs to be scalable to any city (not just New York City, not just a major city.) This goal is complicated by differences in city governments (not all mayors have same level of control) and diverse populations within each city.

From reporting issues, and the “feedback loop”, we need to give people a sense of a map with real-time data on what is going on in different neighborhoods. From there, we can continue building engagement and a sense of community. People can see progress on issues they report, as well as what others are doing.

11:33 AM: Another problem in citizen perception: government participation is traditionally viewed as passive. Government is there to serve ME. Instead, how can we make both sides see each other as partners, rather than service and user? This circles back to building a sense of community, encouraging collaborations not just with government, but among each other.
People want to be the foursquare mayors of their neighborhood. Maybe they don’t just want to get the streetlight fixed, they want to SHARE that they got the streelight fixed.
11:26 AM: Question raised: are we looking to create more inputs for data, or better understanding of the info?

Governments should look at private sector data mining. For example, Target, based on user searches, can predict who is likely pregnant (or even going to be soon.) Why can’t city governments predict issues in the same way? What needs to happen INSIDE of government to make sense of all the “noise”?

The answer first stems from citizens’ question: Do I trust government will actually do something with my data to solve problem?

There is so little trust in government because THERE IS NO FEEDBACK LOOP. Citizens feel like their voices echo into the void and start from a point of mistrust, even when reporting mundane issues. People would feel better if government created (and followed through) on expectations. If I tweet about a pothole, I want a response that it will be filled within the next 10-15 days.

11:15  AM: An idea: what if city spent some marketing dollars to promote social media avenues, such as #311 hashtag, mobile apps? What if the city spent money on education campaigns surrounding these platforms?

Participant believes that NYC and Chicago do that to some extent, but not enough. Also, most existing apps are disparate and focus on function (e.g. to make complaints, find parking.) Would it be easier for citizens if these apps were more integrative,creating a cohesive experience? (Again, what if they were all in one platform?)

Government also needs to improve the automatic monitoring process: gathering and processing both citizen data and social engagement should not increase the administrative burden.

Advances in mobile data may help improve the automation of data monitoring and collection. Progress is already being seen in mobility tracking tests in Singapore and several European cities. However, while the technological foundation (and private companies) is easier to find in the US but citizens here have bigger privacy concerns.

 11:07 AM: Some express wariness of platforms and ask, will people really download more apps and/or interact with another platform? Asking citizens to join another “social network” may be burdensome (and possibly unrealistic, depending on their attitudes towards government.)

What are cities doing now? Are their citizens actually using apps? Answer: mixed results. Tech-savy, pro-government users are, but we don’t see widespread use among the general population. Another consideration: how to handle non English-speakers, and the non tech-savvy?

11:02 AM: Interesting discussion shift: how to leverage the social media people are already using? For example, how can city governments turn tweets into action?

Moreover, to achieve this, should governments create a comprehensive social media platform?  Imagine citizens can sign in to their personalized, city platform, actively submit a complaint or comment, monitor their own data, and opt-in for “experiments.” Experiments can include using smartphone sensors on potholes, monitoring noise, tracking trash collection, etc.

Participant suggests that we need to create an engaging system (look at Facebook, Foursquare community.) Platforms thrive when they provide not just usefulness but a real sense of community. Governments should therefore consider how to create a sense of community and purpose–that if everyone provides data, it leads to a better services, and better lives for all

10:38 AM: Problem 2: citizens have real privacy concerns, wary of government due to past experiences and media coverage. For example, many have read about cops using social media to find criminal activity patterns, leading to arrests (e.g. cannibal cop, recent NYC drug busts). Another privacy concern – NYC “cannibal cop” used his cop status to access to police databases to find potential victims. Adds to concerns of not just government misusing data, but its workers. Many companies are resistant to sharing data with government to protect their users. For example, Twitter fights handing over tweets to police (takes subpoenas to court) –> does this add to combative attitude towards government?
Potential solution: let citizens SEE what gov is collecting on them. Make data collection transparent, perhaps a dashboard with individual sign-in, so citizens can see exactly what is being collected and opt-in/out accordingly.
10:28 AM: Question 1: How to create smarter cities from the bottom up?

Problem 1: Balancing citizen privacy and using plethora of data (via social media, mobile data, other Big Data, etc.) to solve government problems.

There is a rise in using cellphones as a transmitter – this behavior is accepted by users in the private sector, e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Google. These companies promote the idea that info sharing is better for everybody, creates solutions to common problems, meets common needs. Government needs to better define this psychology and transfer the “pro-info sharing” mentality to government interactions.

Potential solution raised: Spend marketing dollars on “Data Donation” campaign. Frame the issue as volunteerism. Donate personal data, in controlled way, to help solve public problems. The marking could be similar to a blood drive, donating organs, etc.

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SESSION DESCRIPTION:  
In his State of the Union Address, President Obama declared, “It is not a bigger government we need, but a smarter government that sets priorities.” Big data, what some call the greatest new resource of the 21st century, has the potential to change the way we govern and make government more efficient.
We can now gather real-time information about traffic, pollution, noise, and environmental and safety conditions by culling data from a range of tools: from the low-cost sensors in mobile phones to more robust monitoring tools installed in our environment. With the computing power to transmit and store the data from these sensors, and the tools to translate raw data into meaningful visualizations, we can identify problems as they happen, design new strategies for city management, and target the application of scarce resources where they are most needed.
With data collected and combined from the built, natural and human environments, we can develop more robust predictive models and use those models to make policy smarter. Perhaps most important, placing better information in the hands of citizens as well as officials will empower people to make more informed choices in their own lives.
As the big data revolution matures, the world’s finest research universities have begun to develop centers to study how “smarter” cities can use information to improve policy, and the technology that enables smarter cities has fueled a growing industry. But to ‘do big data’ really well, we need to resolve community concerns of privacy that are often attached to advanced collection methods.
For researchers to properly “instrument” cities with devices that collect sensor, cellphone, biometric, epidemiological, GPS and other kinds of data, they need to be able to assure communities that privacy and civil liberties will be protected.
One way to address this challenge is to make communities active stakeholders in the process, encouraging citizens to voluntarily contribute data to complement information that is collected from them passively. We have to bring together the worlds of “big data” and “community engagement” to work through appropriate concerns about privacy and regulatory restrictions.
Working with community activists and organizers, big data and smart cities experts, and a range of others who think about incentives for groups to take action together, we want to create ways to get citizens to demand a smarter city, articulate the questions they want to see answered and create the infrastructure and protections necessary to improve quality of life while safeguarding civil liberties.
Potential projects to discuss might include:

• engaging citizens in capturing data for areas where the city doesn’t gather (enough) information; or
• getting citizens and companies to contribute personal data such as around health and wellness to complement regulatory and sensor data;
• getting citizens to understand the work you do, share their own research questions and priorities; or
• getting citizens to generate innovations to solve problems that you
• identify through your work or
• create deliberative dialogue between the citizen engagement and analytics communities to increase buy in and legitimacy and support in those other communities. Enabling people to sign up for pilots a la Trento.

Keep in mind that “citizens” and “public” can mean experts sharing helpful and manageable input about both research agenda and techniques to advance your work. This session will discuss how we can create an engaged, urban, bottom-up smarter cities movement.