The vast quantities of data governments collect can sometimes become too numerous to adequately tell the stories of what’s happening in our world. But interpreted well, they illustrate fact.
When Dr. Leana Wen served as the city of Baltimore’s health commissioner, she would often amplify the point she was making by saying, “Public health saved your life today. You just didn’t know it.” Now a professor of health policy and management at the George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health, Wen is interested in helping people know the things she does.
Read more: US: Data Is a Critical — If Sometimes Overwhelming — Public Tool
Improving user experience for constituents seeking government services is top of mind for public-sector leaders.
Officials participating in the Center for Digital Government's (CDG) premier local government surveys — Digital Cities and Digital Counties — ranked improving customer engagement and experience as their second-highest priority for 2021, trailing only cybersecurity. And state government officials polled in CDG's most recent Digital States survey said simplifying and improving access to constituent services was the top goal for executive leaders.
Read more: US: Must-Haves for Transforming Government Experience
As the director of innovation and technology and chief innovation officer for Coral Gables, alumnus Raimundo Rodulfo runs the city's smart city infrastructure.
Raimundo Rodulfo '16 and his team are on the verge of helping the City of Coral Gables' administration roll out citywide electronic processes and a high-tech, new development service center off Biltmore Way, which will be a one-stop shop for all permitting, code enforcement, planning and zoning needs. It’s part of a broad campaign to modernize the city’s systems—a task that Rodulfo and the city’s leaders have been working toward for years.
Read more: US: Florida: Transforming Coral Gables into model smart city
“Diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility—that is a thread throughout, it is not an afterthought.”
From optimizing school bus routes using machine learning to testing new ways to gather data on air quality, Metro21: Smart Cities Institute at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh has worked on a wide range of projects over the years. The organization’s aim is to look for ways that cutting-edge technology can benefit cities and their residents. Karen Lightman joined Metro21 in 2017 and is now executive director. The institute, established in 2015, serves as an intermediary between local government and nonprofit partners who have identified problems they want to solve and faculty researchers seeking to test their work in real-world settings.
Read more: US: Why Smart Cities are About More Than Just Tech
Access to broadband Internet can dramatically alter quality of life and economic prospects in rural areas, including long-neglected tribal nations. New federal funding is helping to fill some of the gaps in the high-speed network.
If you want to share a large digital file in Lovelock, Nev., you might save time if you first gather about 40 miles’ worth of fiber-optic cables and bury them in a shallow trench alongside Interstate 80. That’s the low-tech gruntwork that makes the high-tech future possible, and it’s what’s happening next year for the rural town 90 miles northeast of Reno, thanks in part to a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Read more: US: Rural Areas in Nevada See Broadband as Key to Progress