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Seattle Information Technology

Facebook hackathon applied Machine Learning to our Open Data platform

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In October, Facebook held a civic hackathon, inviting in-house engineers as well as representatives from other tech companies to apply machine learning to our open data platform (http://data.seattle.gov) to solve problems.

(If you don’t know what machine learning is, here is a great primer: http://www.r2d3.us/visual-intro-to-machine-learning-part-1. In machine learning, computers apply statistical learning techniques to automatically identify patterns in data. These techniques can be used to make highly accurate predictions, and these are the techniques that the hackathon participants applied to our open data platform).

Two projects were deemed to be the winning efforts, one focused on issues related to parking and another focused on helping the public get contractor estimates when they want to undertake a major construction or remodeling project.

On Thursday October 26th, the two winning teams were invited to speak at the monthly “Breakfast of Champions” meeting, and share their project ideas and prototypes with over 40 City staff who act as Open Data Champions across all City departments. The aim was to spur new ideas for future uses of machine learning within the City and for the relevant departments to connect directly with the winning teams.

Find n' Park team

Find n’ Park team

The first project, “Find ‘n Park”, tackled the problem of Seattleites spending a lot of time searching for open parking spaces. Seattle is ranked as one of the hardest places to find a parking spot amongst large US cities; and currently there is no way to get good data on the availability of parking in lots or for on-street parking. Find ‘n Park used deep learning vision models to determine how many cars are currently parked in a particular lot, to give real-time availability of parking. You can find more details on this project here: https://github.com/raghakot/facebook-hackathon

The second project, “Contractor 5”, tackled the problem of looking for a building contractor and quickly getting a realistic cost estimate for new construction or remodels of existing properties. The Contractor 5 tool models the estimated price to complete a project by to within $5,000 by leveraging City permitting (open) data and using natural language processing to compare your project description with similar projects. It greatly simplifies getting an estimate and increases market transparency. You can find more details on this project here: https://github.com/FBMLHACK2017/Contractorfive

Contractor 5 team

Contractor 5 team

Both presentations evoked many questions and follow up interactions between City staff and the winning teams, and gave our Open Data Champs a great insight into the power of ML and how powerful applications could be quickly developed using the open data they are providing. These presentations also provided us with a lot of food for thought re: our 2018 Open Data Plan, especially when it comes to potential investments in using ML to power applications and services, or powering AI scenarios.

Special thanks to the Facebook staff who helped organize this event – Aria Haghighi, Lindsay Amos and SarahBeth Donaghy. We hope this is the first of many partnership interactions!

 

Mayor Burgess signs on to FCC letter regarding Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee

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On November 3, Mayor Tim Burgess joined more than 200 mayors and county leaders across the country in signing a letter to Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Ajit Pai expressing their concern about the FCC’s lack of transparency and the inadequate level of local government representation on the Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee (BDAC).

The BDAC is conducting important proceedings about the regulations covering wireline and wireless broadband infrastructure deployment that could result in adverse consequences to Seattle and other local communities. Elected officials on the letter believe more must be done to create the proper balance between the business needs of the communications industry and the legitimate interests of local governments. To read more about their concerns, and the letter, visit the National Association of Counties.

 

City of Seattle technology leaders condemn calls to repeal Net Neutrality regulations

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Today, the City of Seattle’s Chief Technology Officer Michael Mattmiller condemned the proposal by Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Ajit Pai to repeal net neutrality rules. Mattmiller encourages FCC commissioners to vote against this proposal and keep the internet open and fair for all to use.

“The fight for strong net neutrality protections is important for the internet to remain a space for creativity, innovation and free speech,” said Mattmiller. “Net neutrality is necessary to protect Seattle’s consumers and ensure all internet content is equally accessible.”

Current FCC net neutrality regulations forbids carriers from slowing down internet speed and content delivery. Pai, whom President Donald Trump appointed to lead the FCC in January 2017, believes the Obama era regulations prohibit the industry from expanding and investing in other networks.

In February 2015, under President Barack Obama, the FCC ruled in favor of net neutrality by reclassifying broadband as a common carrier under Title II of the Communications Act of 1934. Those rules went into effect in June of 2015.

“A fair and open internet is vital to everyday life in our communities, not only in Seattle but across the country,” said Jim Loter, Director of Digital Engagement for Seattle Information Technology. “It is also critical for ending the digital divide and ensuring all Seattle residents have access to the tools to be successful.”

The City of Seattle was one of 50 cities that participated in the Day of Action to Save Net Neutrality this past summer. More than 5-million people commented on the possibility to end net neutrality on the FCC’s website. To learn more about Day of Action to Save Net Neutrality, visit www.seattle.gov/netneutrality.

Seattle IT Wires KeyArena for the King County Health Clinic

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When thousands of medical volunteers came together to provide free medical, dental, and vision care to the community, Seattle IT provided the technology and digital capabilities for the King County Health Clinic. Seattle IT’s Eric Bell and his team planned for months to build an Internet network for the event.

The free medical clinic brought together healthcare organizations, civic agencies, non-profits, private businesses, and volunteers from across the state for the free four-day clinic at Seattle Center’s KeyArena.

Seattle IT’s team played a vital role in fusing the grassroots community event with the needed technology to treat patients. The team stretched wire to build hubs and bring dozens of laptops, mobile stations, and printers in the KeyArena online.

“We also built redundant, or backup connections, to ensure the network was working for the entire event,” said Bell. “The laptops, printers, rolling hubs, and all other devices needed to be connected to the Internet without fail to help make this event successful.”

The devices served as patient intake stations to welcome the thousands that lined up through the last weekend in October to get free health services. They collected data given voluntarily from patients who were treated. There were also mobile interpreter stations that streamed from an offsite translator speaking any language to any patient.

The IT planning started in the spring when City employees met with all the organizations involved. They built a diagram to map out what the network would look like and tracked the work through a spreadsheet. Bell says the event grows in complexity every year and his team of Stephen Burke and Kevin Tom, with help from Steve Mulford and Scott Coppess, spent many hours executing the set-up and take-down of the event.

“This was certainly a wonderful and great opportunity to help all the dedicated volunteers who committed their time to make the clinic run smoothly and successfully in providing medical assistance to the homeless community,” said Tom. “My part in setting up the technology is very little compared to how much they’ve accomplished. It was great to see all the happy faces and smiles at the event.”

Telephone capabilities were also added by Mark Peterson from Seattle IT’s telephone services. He set up desk phones with voice mail in several suites in KeyArena for the care providers. Then Peterson modified the call center to allow callers to get information in both English and Spanish.

“I get to work on a variety of interesting projects,” said Peterson. “But it’s a privilege to be part of such a worthy initiative that brings significant benefit to so many.”

This year, the clinic treated more than 4,300 patients and provided more than $3.7 million in healthcare services over the four-day period. Exact treatment numbers are still coming in, but the clinic is expected to have matched the services of last year when 2,485 received dental care, 2,830 received medical care, and 1,373 patients received eye care.

Seattle to hold Digital Literacy Network meet-ups

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Do you want to work together to push forward shared interests in cultivating a more digital literate Seattle for K-12 students, young adults, adults, and senior citizens? Come join us Nov 13, 15, or 17 to share your work and ideas for collaborating to improve digital skills for the community you work with. The Seattle Information Technology Department (Seattle IT) and the City’s Community Technology Advisory Board (CTAB) are convening two in-person and one online session to explore a digital literacy network.

The idea for a digital literacy network or something similar came up in the community input as we were developing Seattle’s Digital Equity Initiative.  Similar groups have formed elsewhere, including Kansas City’s Coalition for Digital Inclusion Alliance and Philadelphia’s Digital Literacy Alliance.  These coalitions are helping market educational opportunities, train trainers, recruit and place volunteers, develop funding, identify skills standards and assessment tools, exchange curriculum, and/or increase awareness of the need for digital literacy. These efforts can complement other broadband, education, STEM, immigrant/refugee, or social service coalitions. They involve a range of community based organizations, companies, public agencies, schools, foundations, and community members.

Seattle IT and CTAB are hosting three meet-ups the week of November 13-17 to learn who wants to be involved and what the needs and priorities would be. One meet-up will be in the north end, one in the south/west area, and one will be virtual (phone/internet).

Please join us for one of these dates:

  • Monday, November 13, 9-10:30 a.m. at Literacy Source, 3200 NE 125th St, Seattle, WA
  • Wednesday, November 15, 10-11:30 a.m. at Delridge Community Center, 4501 Delridge Way SW, Seattle, WA
  • Friday, November 17, 12-1 p.m. virtual meeting online

If you’re interested, please RSVP to david.keyes@seattle.gov with your name, organization, and which meet-up you would like to participate in.  Please let us know if you need special accommodations or an interpreter. Feel free to invite others!

City for All Hackathon: Final Report

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City for All hackathon 2017

The City of Seattle’s City for All hackathon was one of 88 projects nationwide to receive a Challenge Grant from the AARP. Through this grant, the AARP furnished $10,000 in cash prizes to three winners from the hackathon, through partner organization Sound Generations.

The hackathon, held in the Bertha Knight Landes room on September 22-24, was a competition of tech-savvy people to find solutions for aging.

A final report offers a recap of the event, its goals, and next steps.

 

Statement on Public Disclosure Request Release

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Today, the Seattle Information Technology department released the following statement regarding city emails that were inadvertently released through the public disclosure process:

On September 1, 2017 the City of Seattle discovered that portions of certain emails were inadvertently released to a single individual in response to a public disclosure request (PDR).  Upon learning about this error from the PDR requester directly, the City of Seattle took steps to work with the individual who received the information and confirmed the records were securely destroyed.  Additionally, the individual also confirmed that he had not and would not use, share, transfer or discuss the files.

The disclosure included email header information such as “To:”, “From:”, “CC:”, “BCC”, “Date”, “Time” and the first 255 characters of each email subject and message body of all City emails exchanged between January 1, 2017 and February 17, 2017, as well as emails exchanged between March 30, 2017 and April 4, 2017.

The City of Seattle takes seriously its obligation to protect the privacy of City residents and employees. The City has initiated a project to assess its public disclosure and records management policies, and implement new ones that would prevent an issue like this from occurring in the future.

 

FAQ regarding statement on public disclosure request release

What happened?

On September 1, 2017 the City of Seattle discovered that a portion of emails sent to/from City employees between January 1, 2017 and February 17, 2017, and March 30, 2017 and April 4, 2017, were inadvertently released to a single individual in response to a public records request. Specifically, the disclosure included email header information, such as “To” and “From” fields, as well as the first 255 characters of each email subject and message body.

Upon discovery, City staff worked with the individual who inadvertently received the email data and confirmed that he did not and will not use the information, and has securely destroyed the records.

This was NOT a breach of any City database that manages personal identifiers, financial information, or other sensitive data.

The City of Seattle takes seriously its obligation to protect the privacy of City residents and employees while meeting its obligations under the Washington State Public Records Act. The City has initiated a project to assess its public disclosure and records management policies, and implement improvements that would prevent an issue like this from occurring in the future.

Is the issue resolved?

Yes, the City worked with the recipient to confirm that he has not used or shared the email and that it has been securely destroyed. The City is also reviewing its procedures and protocols for responding to public disclosure requests, and making changes to those policies and procedures to reduce the likelihood that this situation happens again.

Are my emails exchanged with the City at risk?

No. The City has worked with the recipient to confirm that the emails were securely destroyed.

Was the City hacked?

No, these records were requested properly through the public disclosure process. An inadvertent error resulted in the requester receiving more information than was intended to have been released.

Who and how many people are affected?

The information released included all emails sent to or from City email addresses during the time period 1/1/2017 and 2/17/2017, and 3/30/2017 and 4/4/2017.

What emails did the requestor receive?

Portions of emails exchanged with the City during the time period January 1, 2017 and February 17, 2017, and March 30, 2017 and April 4, 2017. The email information disclosed included the following: “To,” “From,” “CC,” “BCC,” “Date,” “Time,” and the first 255 characters of the email subject line and message body.

Why does the City provide records to the public?

The Washington State Public Records Act (PRA) requires that all public records maintained by state and local agencies be made available to all members of the public, with very narrow statutory exemptions. A public record is defined in RCW 42.56.010(3) as any writing that is prepared, owned, used, or retained by any state or local government agency, and which contains information that relates to the conduct of government, or the performance of any governmental or proprietary function.  The term “writing” is broadly defined in the PRA, to include not only traditional written records, but also photos, maps, videos, voicemails, emails, text messages and tweets (RCW 42.56.010(4)). For example, email sent by individuals to government email addresses are generally public records and thus disclosable.

Individuals may request documents, emails, and other types of records by contacting public agencies and governments, including the City of Seattle.

Public disclosure laws were enacted in the interest of government transparency. They provide the public with a means of asking for government records and information that may affect them. Under this law, members of the public may request electronic and paper copies of most City records, with a few exceptions.

What steps should I take?

Because the City has worked with the recipient to confirm that the email was securely destroyed, the City does not believe that there are additional actions to take at this time.

City for All hackathon is a hit

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The City for All hackathon was a big civic hit over the weekend. Nine teams competed for recognition and prizes at City Hall’s Bertha Knight Landes room. The theme of the hackathon was to find solutions for the challenges of aging and accessibility. The winner for Best Overall Innovation was the Pandora for Streets/Smellevation Maps team which addressed several of the eight domains of livability in a single app. The app would also include paths in Seattle that present the best smells, sounds, views, and hills. Users can rank how important each aspect is to improve the algorithms of the app. The winner of Best Accessibility Hack was GoInfo Game which gamified the collection of bus stop information that’s crucial for disabled riders. The Winner of Best Use of Open Data and and Best Data Visualization was SeaSidewalks which developed a visualization of data from SDOT’s recent Citywide sidewalk analysis. The team came up with a mechanism for prioritizing sidewalk issues based on factors like proximity to hospitals and other key facilities.

Here’s a complete list of the results and links to team projects:

  • Team Pandora for Streets won Best Overall Innovation with a map to generate better pedestrian experiences. It aims to crowdsource information not typically considered when evaluating the urban environment with data – such as noises and smells – in addition to mapping elements such as tree canopy and points of interest from 10 sources of open data from the city, county, and federal government.
  • Team Reflect & Connect was runner-up for Best Overall Innovation. It used the magic of technology to transform written or spoken journal entries into suggested free activities in the city, with the goal of helping people overcome loneliness and social isolation.
  • Team SeaSidewalks won in two categories: Best Use of Open Data and Best Data Visualization. The tool visualizes data from Seattle Department of Transportation’s recent sidewalk assessment, prioritizing issues as well as points of interest, such as medical facilities, and demographics, to help the Department make the best use of its limited sidewalk repair budget. It can be viewed at https://gngu.shinyapps.io/seattle_sidewalks/.
  • Team GoInfo Game won Best Accessibility Hack with a tool that gamifies crowdsourcing of bus stop data that’s critical for disabled and/or older riders, then makes that data available for use in other tools. The source code is available at https://github.com/opensidewalks/goinfogame.
  • Team Speedy Wheels was runner-up for Best Accessibility Hack, addressing the challenge of requesting specialized rides from public and volunteer services. Currently, for older or disabled riders, finding a ride can be a time-consuming challenge involving numerous phone calls and emails. Check out the presentation from Speedy Wheels at https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1WF769VnMLI5KRlSgva6cVgCNN0ORDtl2ugF8mdPC5cc/edit#slide=id.g25763da086_0_0.
  • Team Find a Ride++ also created a website to simplify the experience of finding a specialized ride throughout King County. The tool can be viewed at https://deeglaze.github.io/findaride_hack/.
  • Team Access for Services created a dashboard visualizing demographic data alongside Aging & Disability Services data.
  • Team SeaViz used virtual reality to visualize 7 years of Aging & Disability Services data on a 3D map of Seattle.
  • Team It’s All Downhill From Here created a taxonomy for road information that could be useful to other app builders.

 

 

Open datasets available for City for All hackathon

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Image courtesy Linnea Westerlind, Year of Seattle Parks

In preparation for the City for All hackathon where data scientists will look at long-term solutions to answering the question, “how can the City contribute to health, longevity, and a vibrant life?” – four City departments – Human Services Department, Parks, Office of Housing and Seattle IT – have released  new open datasets. Together they contain nearlytwo million rows of public data that show what kinds of programs and services the City provides and who takes advantage of them.

Human Service Department

Parks

Housing

Seattle IT

The U.S. Census Bureau has released data about the demographics of Seattle in relation to age, ethnicity, and economic status. You can find that in a SharePoint folder here. The folder also includes data from Sound Generations about its Meals on Wheels program and tables from the most recent Decennial Census and 5-year American Community Survey that cross-tabulate age by an array of characteristics including household size, race, language spoken, income level, car ownership, and disability status. All of the tables are easily mappable and are provided at the census tract level, with some going down to finer geographic levels.

These data visualizations shed light on demographics, aging, and health in our city:

Special thanks to all the data owners and Open Data Champions for making this possible in their departments, and to the Open Data and Privacy teams for their hard work to release this data in time for this weekend’s hackathon.

Hackathon teams will present their solutions on Sunday, September 24 at 2 p.m.to a panel of judges from AARP, Impact Hub Seattle, Microsoft Accessibility, Socrata, Sound Generations, Tableau, and the Age-Friendly Seattle Initiative. Teams will compete for recognition in four categories: Best Overall Innovation, Best Data Visualization, Best Accessibility Hack, and Best Use of Open Data.

Happy hacking!

Seattle Information Technology recognized at NATOA Awards in Seattle

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Pictured from left to right: Brian Roberts, Jose Vasquez, Delia Burke, Jim Loter, Chance Hunt, Vicky Yuki, Derrick Hall, David Keyes, Chris Alejana, Gabriel Garcia

Big honors were given out to Seattle IT at this year’s annual conference of the National Association of Telecommunications Officers and Advisors (NATOA) which took place in Seattle in September. The Digital Engagement Team was honored with two awards. Seattle IT’s Strategic Plan for Facilitating Equitable Access to Wireless Broadband was awarded the 2017 Community Broadband Strategic Plan of the Year. The Technology Matching Fund was awarded the 2017 Community Broadband Digital Equity Project of the Year.

Seattle Channel was named among the best municipal television stations in the nation when it received the prestigious Excellence in Government Programming along with eight other programming awards, including five first-place wins for programming.

Also recognized at the NATOA conference was Tony Perez, director of Seattle’s Office of Cable Communications. Perez, immediate past president and longtime member of NATOA’s Board of Directors, received NATOA’s 2017 Member of the Year award for his contributions to the field, including his leadership, policy development and strategic advice to ensure that communities benefit from the transformational nature of broadband technology.

NATOA is a national association representing the needs and interests of local governments in the areas of communications, broadband and technology. NATOA’s annual government programming awards honor excellence in broadcast, cable, multimedia and electronic programming produced by local government agencies. This year, NATOA received more than 900 entries submitted in 65 categories by local governments across the country.