April 23, 2012
CivicApps for Greater Portland is “an open source design contest to showcase regional open data and promote collaboration between citizens and government to create applications, or ‘apps’, that address civic issues and benefit the greater Portland community.”[1] The CivicApps website provides data from various government agencies in the Portland area including the City of Portland, … [Read More...]
April 23, 2012
The State of Nebraska’s budget transparency website– “Nebraska Spending”– was created in July 2007 as part of several accountability reforms initiated by the State Treasurer’s office. The website allows Nebraskans to access state revenue and spending information in a straightforward and comprehensible format. The website includes: Fiscal Year Expenditures, which provides transaction-level detail on the … [Read More...]
April 23, 2012
In 2009, the Ministry of Infrastructure in Ontario, Canada launched a website to allow users “to track the progress of recently announced infrastructure stimulus projects in their community and across the province.”[1] The website’s goal is to provide “greater transparency and accountability to Ontario residents regarding federal-provincial infrastructure stimulus funding by highlighting the provincial contribution … [Read More...]
April 23, 2012
In 2011 the Icelandic Constitutional Council used a variety of social media tools to engage citizens in the process of redrafting the national constitution. The Council posted weekly drafts of articles for the new constitution on its website and invited public comment and debate. Videos of each of the Council’s sessions were streamed live on … [Read More...]
October 20, 2011
A special review of the Office of Inspector General’s Exempt Expenditures was done by Mitchell and Titus to assist the Office of Compliance to determine whether: (a) the IGO’s expense calculations are in accordance with the established procedures and controls regarding those expenditures; and (b) the IGO’s expenditures within each of the confidential line items … [Read More...]
October 13, 2011 Leave a Comment
Yesterday, the administration released its proposed 2012 budget. As in past years, the proposed budget was presented in pdf format. To help facilitate analysis of the City’s budget, we have converted the pdf into Excel and CSV files.
September 29, 2011
The City of Chicago’s Small Business Improvement Fund (SBIF) is a program which reimburses recipients for eligible improvements to buildings. Since 2000, the SBIF program has funded over $28 million in grants to over 600 applicants. SBIF is funded by Tax Increment Financing (TIF) revenues and administered by SomerCor 504, a non-profit development firm. SBIF … [Read More...]
September 29, 2011
State Law requires that all governmental units publish within six months of the close of each fiscal year (December 31 for Chicago), financial statements presented in conformity with generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) and audited by a licensed public accountant. The purpose of the Comprehensive Annual Financial Statement (CAFR) is to provide complete and accurate … [Read More...]
July 20, 2011
The City has recently posted all overtime payments made during 2008, 2009, 2010, and thru April 2011. (Notably excluded is overtime payment data for the Chicago Police Department, which is the department where the most overtime payments occur.) The City posted this data in a pdf format, instead of in a format that easily enables … [Read More...]
May 12, 2011
In order to provide the incoming Mayoral administration with information about the inner workings of City government, the Daley administration developed a transition document with information on each City department. The report includes descriptions of how each department is organized and a summary of the services it provides.
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