Data and Analytics

How governments handle data matters for inclusion

Algorithms and artificial intelligence can improve the effectiveness and efficiency of public services. But if underlying data is not handled thoughtfully, it can mirror and perpetuate existing inequalities.

  • By Suzanne J. Piotrowski, Erna Ruijer and Gregory Porumbescu, The Conversation

No longer just nice to have: Data literacy essential to digital government

While more data-mature cities are seeing payoffs from upskilling staff, even small gains can make a big difference.

  • By Stephanie Kanowitz

There’s one year left to turn the corner on evictions

COMMENTARY | By taking advantage of ARPA funds, local leaders can better utilize eviction data to keep more people in their homes.

  • By Yuliya Panfil and Karen A. Lash

States will soon be required to track post-welfare employment outcomes

The new rule, part of the debt deal struck in June, is a bipartisan effort by Congress to improve welfare assistance and lift recipients out of poverty.

  • By Kery Murakami

How one state’s data office improves government services

Indiana is connecting data from different agencies and training front-line workers to tackle tough problems.

  • By Daniel C. Vock

Why you should consider outcome-based security

Agencies can better align their cybersecurity and business priorities when they have affordable risk management solutions that deliver measurable results.

  • By Stephanie Kanowitz

Eliminating the speedbumps in EV charging station buildout

COMMENTARY | Energy management as a service gives EV charging station operators cloud-based tools for remote asset management and will help ensure they have the data to comply with the government’s 97% station uptime requirement.

  • By Frederick Reynolds

City greenlights autonomous vehicle testing for public transit

Phoenix wants AV providers to test automated driving systems to help it make decisions about future public transit.

  • By Kaitlyn Levinson

First responders need presumptive ID technology to better assess and act on hazardous incidents

The ability to accurately identify hazardous materials at the scene provides public safety officials with enhanced personal safety, controls public risk and delivers actionable onsite intelligence.

  • By Jeff Brodeur

Digital twins for cities promising, yet problematic

Complex systems like digital twins pose both technical and adaptive challenges, so communities must ensure they have both the right technology and the people with skills to use and maintain them, a new IDC report advises.

  • By Stephanie Kanowitz

Wildlife management migrates to the cloud

Utah’s Division of Wildlife Resources relies on cloud services to process the massive amounts of location data it needs to analyze real-time movements of elk.

  • By Stephanie Kanowitz

With updated data profiles, opioid detectors ID latest drugs

Thanks to a federal partnership, the portable detectors will get upgraded drug profiles, and their manufacturers will provide those new drug reference libraries to public safety agencies that already possess a detection device.

  • By Susan Miller
Featured eBooks
The State of Trust in Government
Cybersecurity in State and Local Government
Building Data Literacy in the State and Local Workforce

How sports data can help public safety agencies up their game

Technology originally developed for athletes can help public safety agencies to track first responders’ performance during training to sharpen real-life mission efficiency.

  • By Kaitlyn Levinson

Assistive AI can revolutionize public safety collaboration

Cloud-based collaboration supported by artificial intelligence can generate the insights that help multiple agencies operate efficiently across routine and major incidents.

  • By Kalyn Sims

Machine learning too expensive for state archives – for now

The Oregon State Archives will pivot from machine learning to advanced analytics for streamlining management of several terabytes of new data.

  • By Chris Teale

How to build future-facing ERP

Thoroughly understanding the limitations of the legacy platform and mapping out the business case for replacing an enterprise resource planning system will help agencies build for the future instead of reconstructing the past.

  • By Stephanie Kanowitz

Understanding why government automation projects fail

COMMENTARY | A deep, data-driven analysis of workflows will give agencies a true, accurate and unbiased picture of actual operations and show where automation can streamline processes.

  • By Brian Hettinger

Earthquake data powered by next-gen supercomputers

A collaboration among national labs aims to provide an open-access website with datasets on how ground motion affects infrastructure during earthquakes.

  • By Kaitlyn Levinson

Contact center modernization boosts satisfaction for city residents, staff

With more calls coming into its legacy social services help lines, New York City turned to a cloud-based platform that reduced the number of dropped calls and gave agents easy, digital access to essential customer information.

  • By Stephanie Kanowitz

How Florida is looking to build the ‘nation’s first AI university’

The tech is embedded into the curriculum but the University of Florida is also scouting out new uses for it in campus operations and student performance.

  • By Chris Teale

Flood forecasts in real-time with block-by-block data could save lives – a new machine learning method makes it possible

A sophisticated flood model can be used to train local flood hazard models that can pinpoint conditions street by street using real-time storm forecasts.

  • By Valeriy Ivanov, The Conversation