Reconvening DC Resource Platform group: Feb 21-23

[Greg Bloom]

Hi folks - We have much to discuss!

First of all: Will you be able to join us for a meeting on Feb 21st? And/or the Open Data Day Hackathon on Feb 22-23rd? 

On Friday Feb 21 (location TBD; time TBD but probably the second half of the day) we will have an action-oriented meeting. But since we have a lot of new people in the mix and a lot has happened since we previously convened, it might require a bit of time to get things moving. I'd like to structure the day to give people the option of coming to the parts that are most appropriate for them -- so we'll probably have an intro review session, and then a few working groups. 

IN ANY CASE, WE WILL FEED YOU :D

Please let me know what your schedule looks like on that day/weekend, and what your interest might be: 

an introduction to the issue, 

a discussion of a long-term course of action, 

actually working with data and tech.

Some background: I've just joined the Code for America team that built an open referral platform in San Mateo County. I'll be leading up their community-building strategy to drive the development of open referral platforms both in the broader Bay Area and beyond. I'm committed to ensure that DC is right there with the Bay Area in the pilot phase -- and if we can establish an agreed course of action, I can work to bring resources and support to the table to make it happen. So far, we have the District government, Bread for the City, and a few others on board -- let's see what else we need to finally get this underway.

Looking forward,
Greg

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• gjb •

202.643.3648

[Charise Van Liew]

Woohoo! Congrats, Greg.

I'm already registered for Open Data Day Hackathon and just blocked off 2nd half of day on the 21st for meeting. Interested in:

• a discussion of a long-term course of action, 
  

• actually working with data and tech (if needed, I'm guess the former will need attention first)
  

Charise Van Liew

email cha...@fusedc.org | cell 202-841-0407

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[Charise Van Liew]

Hi Greg,

Checking in to see if there's a meeting happening on the 21st.

Thanks!

Charise

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202-841-0407
http://twitter.com/fusedc

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[Greg Bloom]

Charise, thanks for checking in. Yes, we are going to have a meeting next week, Fri 2/21!

We don't have final details on date and time, but I expect it to be at Bread for the City from around 12pm or 1pm. And I expect it to run 3-4 hours, although we'll divvy that up into intro up front and deep dive in the back half, so people could calibrate accordingly.

We will have food for all who rsvp. 

So far I have on my list:
Bread for the City
Public Defender Service
Lutheran Social Services
Downtown BID's homeless services
DC DHS and DMHHS (and OCTO?)

I'd like to see a couple more people involved in resource directories, and a few who may not have institutional affiliations (civic hackers, local in-the-know folks such as Charise, etc).

The agenda looks roughly like so (open to change based on your feedback):

• Review our research and vision as developed over the last two years.
  
• Hear from the gov about the state of their 211 system, plans for the future, and challenges.
  
• Hear from me about the OpenReferral initiative (w/ Google, Code for America, etc) and what it might look like to be a pilot partner.
  
• List our questions and suss out potential branches of work.
  
• Break out into groups accordingly and come up with long-term goals and short term objectives (like as in really short term for the hackathon the next day, and near short term as in the next couple of months)
  

Sorry for the radio silence on my end, y'all. I've been hauling across all of California, seeding teams like this there. I'm really excited to get back to work in the District!

~gb

[COHHO]

I'm still interested, but my day is spoken for.  Keep me in the loop!

Best wishes,

Nechama

On Wed, Jan 29, 2014 at 1:47 PM, Greg Bloom <greg....@gmail.com> wrote:

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[Greg Bloom]

Nechama, I would be happy to come to you to discuss in person before or after the mtg. Likewise anyone else who can't make it Friday.

If you're interested, contact me off-list and we will find a time!

[Greg Bloom]

Hi folks - 

We're going to meet in 2 days! Here are the details: 

Date/Time: Friday 1-4pm. (NOTE: the first hour of 1-2pm will just be lunch and orientation. If you can be fed and fully up-to-speed on the background, then you're welcome to join us at 2pm.)

 

Place: Bread for the City, 1525 7th st NW

Agenda: 

1pm: lunch and orientation. reviewing the history of this conversation, and some of the key concepts (like: what is the data and what are the challenges of collecting it; what is a schema and what is a taxonomy; what is an 'API' and how can it enable 'anyone' to access this data; who are the stakeholders involved and what are their needs; what we have done in the last two years; etc)

2pm: We'll get updates and explore our objectives. In addition from hearing from each participant, we'll get lengthy updates from a) the DC government about 2-1-1 project; and b) from Greg (me) about the Open Referral initiative and the associated partnership with Code for America, Google, etc. Then we'll go around again for questions and observations; then we'll sort out everything that's been discussed into topics and break out to dig deeper.

3pm: This can be a bit fluid, but I generally figure we'll form work groups according to 1) vision/process (non-technical stuff about what we're trying to accomplish, who should be at the table, how decisions will be made and evaluated) and 2) data/systems (technical stuff). 

4pm: Most people can probably head off, but a few will hopefully stay to prep a project plan for the hackathon on Saturday/Sunday.

Attendees: this is the list I have so far. If you're on this list and you have any dietary preferences, or if you're not on this list but you plan to come, I need to hear from you!

Myself and a co-facilitator

Bread for the City (Stacey Johnson)

DC Gov (Susie Cambria +2)

Public Defender Service (Betsy Biben)

Downtown BID Homeless Services Agency (Deborah Bey)

Criminal Justice Coordinating Committee (Mannone Butler)

United Way National Capital Region (Mary Ann Floto)

Maybe Catholic Charities (Jacqueline Ogg)

Please note*: By the time things really get started at 2pm, I'm assuming that everyone will already be in agreement that this information should be "open," meaning freely downloadable in bulk and real-time accessible to any application or other means of consumption; that our objective is NOT to build one system that we try to force everyone to use, but instead our objective is to figure out how to make available one standardized, reliable set of data that anyone can have access to; and that the government and community anchor institutions each have important roles to play in making this happen. If something about that sounds unclear to you, either let's check in before the meeting or at least make sure to come at 1pm for the orientation.

Looking forward to it!

Greg

* I figure that if there's anyone out there who really needed to read that note, you probably wouldn't have made it this far... but hey - there it is! The rest of y'all saw it. 

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• gjb •

202.643.3648