San Rafael, CA – Determined to provide more online information to its residents, the County of Marin has created an online collection of analytics and reports that will help local residents learn more and collaborate to solve issues in their community.
Marin County Open Data features statistics ranging from emergency medical response rates to food safety inspection results to kindergarten immunizations. The data, for instance, shows that Sausalito has more calls for emergency responses to bicycle or sports injuries than any other location in Marin. The goal with the portal is to share data, start conversations, foster analysis and discuss potential solutions to the hot-button issues.
The portal was created by the staff of the County’s Department of Information Services and Technology (IST) and can be accessed quickly at data.marincounty.org.
“We’re excited about this because we’ve been working to enhance access to information and self-service by sharing data with the public,” said Rwena Holaday, IST Assistant Director. “We’re making non-personal public information broadly accessible. We’re eager to provide a means to engage with the local software developer community about the most effective ways to use this information.”
Another example of the uses of the portal will be at the County’s first hackathon for students. At the Hack4Health event on April 1, participants will use Marin County Open Data to download and share raw data so they can help devise technical solutions to health challenges that could benefit residents of Marin.
The roots of this effort date to the Marin County Board of Supervisors’ 5 Year Business Plan, approved in October 2015, which included a vision of being a more responsive government with innovation as a core value. One strategy is to increase online options for the community to conduct business with the County or learn more about the services it provides.
“The County hopes to encourage residents to become more familiar with how their government is performing and build tools that ultimately make Marin an even better place to live, work and play,” County Administrator Matthew Hymel said. “Transparency is the key to increasing public trust and drives accountability. The better informed our residents are about what we do, the more responsive we can be to their needs and the more effective we can be.”
With the launch of Marin County Open Data, done in conjunction with Socrata, the County joins the City and County of San Francisco, the County of San Mateo and the County of Alameda in the open data movement. Seattle-based Socrata is a leading global provider of open data and government performance management solutions.