A Message from Our Executive Director, Beth Blauer

A Message from Our Executive Director, Beth Blauer

Centers for Civic Impact stand with those fighting against racism and police murdering black people. We unequivocally believe that Black Lives Matter. We acknowledge our organizational privilege and commit to work with public sector organizations who are ready to use...
4 Tips to a Clear and Friendly Dashboard

4 Tips to a Clear and Friendly Dashboard

A city dashboard’s primary goal is to give citizens a clear, user-friendly tool to see how well their city is doing. When designing your dashboard, always keep in mind how easy it would be for the average citizen to use. If you include too many factors into your...
So you want to start a data academy…

So you want to start a data academy…

By: Eric Reese Data can be powerful. But to really harness your data, you need people skilled in analysis, data management, and data-informed decision-making. Many cities are taking that lesson to heart and launching their own data academies to help employees learn to...
Taking Charge of Health: Lincoln, NE’s KPIs

Taking Charge of Health: Lincoln, NE’s KPIs

Lincoln, NE developed 132 performance indicators to measure the City’s progress toward the 39 goals in the eight outcome areas. On its Taking Charge website, the city displays justification and support for each performance measure and describes the strategy to achieve...
Richmond, VA’s Neighborhood KPIs

Richmond, VA’s Neighborhood KPIs

Richmond is in the process of aligning its priorities, goals, and metrics. The city has identified 44 KPIs in its seven focus areas to track progress toward the city’s strategic priorities. Richmond tags each Key Priority Indicator (KPI) to the associated initiative...
Being ‘Sensitive’ about Data Sensitivity

Being ‘Sensitive’ about Data Sensitivity

Open data is great because it’s open. But not all data is meant to be open. A lot of it is “sensitive.” What could be “open data” is often classified as “sensitive data” to protect the personal information and identity of individuals. Sensitive data may be restricted...
Performance Measures – How Less Becomes More

Performance Measures – How Less Becomes More

One day last fall, I was talking with a colleague about a question that had come up from our partners in Baltimore’s performance management program, CitiStatSMART. Those folks were looking to identify key performance indicators (KPI) to use with certain city...