Civic tech tools for better city budgets

Civic tech for TOUsing digital tools to make city budgets more

understandable and engaging

Matthew Gray (@matthewdhgray)Asher Zafar

What is civic tech?

• ‘Civic tech’ describes the application of new technologies to help solve public problems

• Citizens, activists, coders, public servants and entrepreneurs

• A growing industry - investment in civic tech $431 million from 2011-2013

(Source: Knight Foundation)

Budget tools

• Visualizations - interactive graphic representation of budget data

• Simulators - visualization with a greater degree of interactivity, with modifiable variables

• Digital consultations - platforms enabling citizen input into the budget process, from surveying to participatory budgeting

Budget Visualization

Phildadelphia http://www.phila.gov/openbudget/

Arlington http://www.arlingtonvisualbudget.org/

Oakland http://openbudgetoakland.org/

http://openbudgetoakland.org/2013-2015-adopted-budget-flow.html

Ontario Salary (Tableau) http://www.davidanalytics.com/ontario-public-salary-disclosure.html

Boston http://budget.data.cityofboston.gov/#/

US Federal (d3) http://www.brightpointinc.com/interactive/budget/index.html?source=d3js

Budget Simulation

Mississauga http://mississaugabudget2015.budgetallocator.com/#ba

Toronto Star http://www.thestar.com/news/city_hall/2015/can-you-find--86m-in-cuts-and-balance-toronto-city-hall-s-budget.html

NYT Federal http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/11/13/weekinreview/deficits-graphic.html?_r=1&

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/13/behind-the-timess-deficit-project/

Budget EngagementOntario https://talk.ontario.ca/

London, ON http://buildabudget.ca/budget.html

Discussion questions1. What information would you, as a citizen, want to

get out of one of these tools?

2. How well did these tools make that information understandable?

3. What would the ideal Toronto budget tool look like, and how might it get built?

4. How could we strengthen Toronto’s civic tech community?