MOVING TECH-STARVED CIVIC GOVERNMENT INTO THE DATA AGE
Former White House chief information officer says that investing in innovation is the only path forward
As the first federal chief information officer in the United States, appointed under President Barack Obama, Vivek Kundra pushed the idea of using public data for public good.
Today, Kundra, now executive vicepresident of public sector for the cloud computing giant Salesforce, believes that democratization of data starts with leadership at the top. He says Toronto is in good hands. When Mayor John Tory visited Silicon Valley earlier this year to pitch innovation opportunities back home, the two hit it off. Recently, Kundra made good on an invitation from Tory to visit Toronto and speak directly to the bureaucrats in charge of making the city tick — and those holding all the data.
The Star sat down with Kundra to ask how the city’s data can be a force for good and why it is ripe for innovation. When you started at the White House, it seemed there were multiple challenges. There was the need to look for efficiencies, but also the public-facing kinds of technology that benefit people’s everyday lives. From the city’s perspective, how do we evolve?
If you think about the average citizen, who’s using their mobile device and swiping and tapping on the phone to get a car to pick them up, have a bookshop at their doorsteps, or get groceries delivered, you know they live in a world where there’s an app for that. Yet, when you’re dealing with a government, there’s a form for that — whether you’re submitting a three-part paper form, standing in a physical line or holding on the phone.
What happens over time is you sort of compound this tech deficit in government. And you have the ability now to close that technology gap, when you look at these massive shifts that we’re seeing in the consumer web — you look at the Lyfts and Ubers of the world or the Airbnbs of the world that are disrupting traditional industries. I think government also is in the midst of that disruption right now. It’s hard for me to imagine the city taking the next step. A year ago, I wrote about one of our committees considering a contract to update from an email system from the ’90s just to get city staff onto Outlook. How do we go from that to cloud computing?
It’s leadership — you hold executives in charge of the operations that they’re responsible for accountable for it. At the end of the day, you’re operating in the interest of your citizens. Taxpayers deserve for the city to move forward. And frankly, if you look at the growth in the population and … growth in the budget, the only path is innovation. That’s the only way you’re going to be able to address some of the most difficult challenges you face. Toronto releases some types of data that seem of little practical value, like the names of the most popular dogs and cats. Should there be criteria for what gets released?
I think on democratizing data you have to define high-value data sets. I remember when we were doing this at the White House; we had this funny situation where the CIA, the data set that they released was their lunch menu (laughs) — I think as a joke, right? So, we were like, “What is this?” As a result of that we said, OK, we need to define what a high-value data set is: a data set that has economic impact; it has impact on citizens’ lives. So, you can be much more targeted, while making sure you’re abstracting personally identifying information.
I believe the default setting of the government should be open, transparent and participatory. Too often everybody makes it secretive and opaque and closed, and we need to get away from that. The burden should be (on having an answer to the question): Why do you need to keep that data set closed? Is it enough for the city to release data and sit back and wait for startups and interested parties to do something with it and offer that back — or should the city be more proactive in trying to do something to benefit the public?
I think you have to do both. (First) release the data: the way I think of that is it’s like a grocery store, and that’s kind of the raw materials. But then the city should encourage an ecosystem of developers and startups to build on top of (the data), and that would be the equivalent of different restaurants you could create. Do you think the city would benefit from having a chief innovation officer?
Absolutely. I think that’s highly necessary, to really drive that coordinated approach to what is true north for the city when you’re talking about innovation. But you’ve got to be careful innovation doesn’t become an empty word.