Crime

New App Lets Residents Access Oakland Public Records

Published

11 years ago

October 21, 2013

Oakland unveiled the fruits of being a Code for America fellowship city yesterday with a new open data application called RecordTrac that let’s the public easily search city records, file freedom of information requests and do data queries.

The new app handles the huge volume of record requests that City staff gets with an efficient, web-based query system that should free up city staff time and add transparency to city processes, officials said Tuesday at a launching event.

< p>It was built by three coders, Sheila Dugan, Richa Agarwal and Cris Cristina, who are Code for America fellows appointed to work with Oakland after this city was selected last winter as one of 10 Code for America Fellowship cities. The coders said the tool even responds to requests mistakenly sent to the city instead of the county by directing users to the correct URL.

Within 24 hours of the public launch, 40 requests were filed in addition to the 466 requests that were made through a soft launch within City Hall.

In a city with an active hacking community, including a group called OpenOakland that’s working on its own ideas to improve city services, Oakland and Code for America officials said this is the right application for Oakland because it will assist in that collaboration and answer calls for more transparency in government. That is even as other Code for America cities work on such issues as crime and food assistance, issues important to Oakland as well.

“I think it is exactly the right app for Oakland because there was a lot of tension around public records,” said Code for America founder Jennifer Pahlka.

She and city officials said problems with the previous system resulted more from a former cumbersome data system rather than a desire on the part of the city to keep records private. “When we saw that city workers were trying so hard to answer,” residents’ requests “and yet the systems got in the way,” so they realized a new data app could serve a lot of purposes. Pahlka, an Oakland resident involved in the early civic hacking events here, said RecordTrac app could repair citizens’ relationship with the city around compliance with records requests.

Oakland Mayor Jean Quan and City Attorney Barbara Parker said the city’s goals have included increasing efficiency and becoming more transparent and RecordTrac does both.

The Web-based system has three main menu items: a searchable archive of requests made to the city, an easy template for making a new request, and a way to track the progress of your request.

Dugan, one of the fellows, said the three of them interviewed employees in every city department, “from the fire department to IT,” before concluding that a public records request app was the thing to work on. She said it will improve work flow systems within city departments in addition to adding more transparency for residents.

Cristina said they replaced what had been “a complex system that was difficult to use” with a simple and elegant system that “was built from the ground up around users.”

Other Code for America cities include San Francisco, whose fellows are working on a food stamp enrollment application, and New York, whose fellows are working on a criminal justice application.

Many Oakland residents have gotten involved in grassroots coding efforts and hackathons, much of which has now coalesced in OpenOakland, founded by Steve Spiker, an Oakland resident and Urban Strategies employee who this summer was named a White House Champion of Change for his work on creating OpenOakland and spurring collaboration between residents and their local government. Spiker tweeted a “congratulations” about RecordTrac on Twitter shortly after the application was announced.

Pahlka, too, is an Oakland resident as well as a nationally honored technologist. She is actually currently on leave from Code for America while she serves as a White House deputy director of technology for one year.

That both are Oakland residents is testament to the technology savvy here.

Mayor Quan bragged that “the founder of Code for America lives in Oakland” in describing the tech-savvy citizenry of this city and said Oakland was lucky to get fellows from the organization known as “the Peace Corps for geeks.”

The City of Oakland has collaborated in these efforts not only in seeking to become a Code for America fellowship city but also in creating an open data website called data.oaklandnet.com last January and earlier a community engagement website called EngageOakland.com. More recently, as part of its collaboration with Code for America it created answers.oaklandnet.com which is a web site for citizens to ask questions of the city.

First posted by Oakland Local.

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Oakland Post: Week of December 25 – 31, 2024

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of December 25 – 31, 2024

Published

7 hours ago

December 26, 2024

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Man Found Guilty After Shooting Gun into Parked Car with Sleeping Passengers

Carmen Watts fired his gun into a parked car, where two unarmed men were sleeping, several times. One victim suffered multiple wounds, while the other was uninjured. He now faces 23 years in state prison. His sentencing is scheduled for Monday, Feb. 3, 2025 in Department 10 at the René C. Davidson Courthouse in Oakland.

Published

3 days ago

December 24, 2024

Oakland Post

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By Post Staff

A jury has returned a guilty verdict against Camren Watts on two counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm for an unprovoked shooting near the intersection of 51^st Street and West Street in Oakland back in September of 2020.

Watts fired his gun into a parked car, where two unarmed men were sleeping, several times. One victim suffered multiple wounds, while the other was uninjured. He now faces 23 years in state prison. His sentencing is scheduled for Monday, Feb. 3, 2025 in Department 10 at the René C. Davidson Courthouse in Oakland.

“I first want to thank the jury for their service and careful deliberation in this trial,” said Chief Assistant District Attorney Royl Roberts. “I also want to congratulate the Prosecution Team for their hard work securing this conviction and recognize the Inspector on this assignment for their support throughout the case and jury trial. This guilty verdict reaffirms that anyone who uses a gun to harm people in our community will be held to account for their actions in a court of law.”

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New Interim Mayor Nikki Bas Takes Office, Announces Balanced Budget

“The Council made difficult but clear decisions last night,” Mayor Bas said in a statement released Thursday. “With yesterday’s budget adoption, the City of Oakland is on track to maintain our immediate fiscal health and our emergency reserves are at the required level.”

Published

3 days ago

December 24, 2024

Oakland Post

Nikki Fortunato Bas. Courtesy photo.

‘The Council made difficult but clear decisions,’ said Bas

Kaplan proposed for Interim District 2 Council seat

By Post Staff

Oakland City Council President Nikki Fortunato Bas was sworn in interim mayor on Wednesday and immediately sat down with City Council members to rebalance the city’s budget, closing a projected deficit and maintaining emergency financial reserves.

“The City now seeks to move forward in strong collaboration with its Labor partners and the community-led Budget Advisory Commission toward long-term fiscal sustainability,” she said. “We all deserve to feel safe and secure, whether we’re taking our kids out to play, running our essential small businesses, parking our car on the street, or walking home at night.”

Bas took over as mayor from Sheng Thao, whose last day in office was Tuesday after losing a recall election in November.

“Thank you for choosing me to serve as your mayor. As the first Hmong American woman to become the mayor of a major American city, it has been the honor of my lifetime. I am deeply proud of the progress we created together,” Thao said.

Bas, in her final remarks as a councilmember, proposed that the City Council appoint Kaplan to replace her until the April election.

“As you know Councilmember Kaplan is retiring, she is willing to serve in this interim capacity. She is a resident of District 2 in Jack London, will not run for the seat in the special election; and I believe that she is uniquely qualified to jump in and immediately help to serve our District 2 residents, as well as key projects moving forward, and of course help lead the city’s biennial budget process,” Bas said.

At its meeting this week, the Council affirmed the City Administrator’s budget balancing actions, utilizing unrestricted and transferred funds to help fill the gap and provided direction and strategies to close the remaining need.

The proposals include finding new revenue from increased events and success at the Oakland Coliseum/Arena and other sources, making any further cuts a last resort.

They also proposed to immediately collect unpaid business taxes by doing an internal audit and strengthen controls on OPD overtime overspending.

Said Councilmember Kaplan, “It is vital to protect core public services, and the long-term fiscal solvency of our city. I am honored that the extra available funds I had previously identified have been confirmed, and are being incorporated into budget strategies, allowing Oakland to reduce cuts and restore reserves. In addition, important public serving and revenue-generating functions are being strengthened, including to reduce blight and provide safer, cleaner streets.”

Councilmember Kevin Jenkins (District 6) said, “The Fire Department, which had been preserved from cuts in July, was able to rapidly stop the Keller Fire from growing out of control, which prevented a repeat of the horrific loss of life and loss of homes that took place during the 1991 Oakland Hills Fire.”

According to a Mayor’s Office press statement, Oakland’s investments in the Oakland Police Department and the Department of Violence Prevention have yielded the fastest and most dramatic reduction in homicides in the city’s history.

The City’s deep investments in public safety over the past year continue to pay off, with homicides down 35% year-to-date and overall crime down by 34% since last year. The Public Safety Leadership team is very strong with OPD Chief Floyd Mitchell, DVP Chief Dr. Holly Joshi, OFD Chief Damon Covington, and their deputy chiefs having over a century of collective experience in Oakland.

The budget proposals preserve Oakland’s Ceasefire violence intervention strategy, prioritize OPD patrol and investigations, and continue services to improve 911 response times, with currently 71% of calls answered within 15 seconds or less — a dramatic improvement over the prior year, the press statement said.

Oakland’s investments in sidewalk repair, street paving, clearing abandoned autos, and safer conditions on our roadways are improving both safety and quality of life. The proposals restore funding for important and needed bicycle and pedestrian safety projects, street paving, and parking enforcement, the statement said.

The Council is considering a sales tax ballot measure for the April 15 special election. The proposed half-cent sales tax increase would raise approximately $29 million annually. Ongoing revenue generation and improved efficiencies would help address the City’s structural deficit in the next two-year budget.