“We were deployed very quickly to start things like open data and we jumped from being not on the radar to first on the open data census,” Miguel Sangalang, deputy mayor for budget and innovation, since June, told Techwire.
As data became more available to the office, more of the projects were based on the information.
“At the offset, he created the Mayor’s Office of Budget and Innovation to try and align the fact that there were the core functions of government performance management and new things that were cutting edge that were coming out, and align them so that they work together,” Sangalang said. “The innovation part is actually innovating how we’re trying to inform our service on the government side.”
“The mayor’s think and do tank” has “shifted the paradigm” on many projects, through in-house data science and design talent.
- The LA Business Portal offers resources and advice for starting a small business, right down to recommending site locations.
- The LA Index of Change allows users to see how the demographics within ZIP codes have changed, including age, education level and income of residents.
- The Performance Management and Budget division looks into how the department puts “the money where the mouth is” by tracking what money is being spent and how it affects the areas it is responsible for.
- Sanitation Services “went from a wholly responsive type of service” where employees responded to resident complaints, to a proactive approach. The department created a cleanliness index with Samsung, creating a way to track which streets needed more services in real time.
- The city is also collecting geospatial information to better deliver services.
Other areas the office is involved in include:
- Sustainability
- Homelessness
- Creating a mobile workforce
- Interorganizational work
