8 / 44
8 | Citizens Report 2017
SPOTLIGHT:
Open Government
A Vision
On January 5, 2015, just one month
after being elected to serve our
community, Maple Ridge Council
embarked on the Open Government
Initiative.
The Task Force developed three
guiding principles for the project;
1. Increase citizen’s access to
information.
2. Increase citizen’s participation,
engagement and collaboration
in community issues.
3. Increase transparency and
accountability of actions.
A ‘Citizens Representative Working
Group’ (CRWG) was established to
ensure that the needs of our citizens
were front and centre for the project.
Throughout the spring and summer
of 2015 this dedicated group of
volunteers held forums and invited
submission from the community that
would improve citizens understanding
of local government processes,
decision making, accountability and
transparency. On October 8, 2015
the CRWG presented the Task Force
with a document containing 58
recommendations on how to achieve a
gold standard of open governance.
A Plan
While the CRWG was developing
their recommendations staff looked
at what other communities were
doing related to the concept of ‘open
government.’DavidEaves,arecognized
expert on open government, open data
and digital transformation sat down
with the team tasked with delivering
on the recommendations and shared
his experience and advice. That advice
was to look at the business value of the
data and build a solution that enables
citizens to see the stories hidden in the
data.
Inspired by a world expert and
armed with an incredible set of
recommendations
developed
by
citizens, a cross department team
led by Christina Crabtree, Chief
Information Officer, went to work to
‘action’ this exciting project.
The Portal
On October 17, 2017 the ‘Open
Government Portal’ (OPG) launched
to the public, the culmination of
two years of consultation, research
and refinement to deliver on
Council’s vision and the CRWG
recommendations.
Every department had a role in the
development of the Portal. The team
of technology professionals at the
core of this work found a way to use
existing City software platforms to
reduce the cost to deliver the OGP
and leverage the expertise within the
organization using existing data.
“Revealing some of the individual
components of the larger OGP such
as the Crime Map and the Contract
Registry Search allowed us to test
some of the concepts that the team
were developing,” said Ms. Crabtree.
Scan this QR Code with
your mobile device for
instant access to your
Open Government Portal.