I would like to answer that question by explaining to you my personal journey through this open data event and the consultation.
We at the City of Ottawa have an IT subcommittee. The purpose of the committee is to look at any issues dealing with technology. As I mentioned earlier, we were requested by council to review our data dissemination policy.
If you live in Ottawa, you know we have a fiscal reality to deal with. Those IT subcommittees are open to the public. They are open to delegations. One delegation represented said to the committee if you give us access to the data, we'll develop the application free of charge to the city. That caught a lot of attention from the elected officials. This is how I first became aware of the community out there who wanted to have open data.
Following that, they invited me to what is called a hackerfest, where people go in for a weekend or half an afternoon and develop an application that is good for the region and the city. I saw the enthousiasme of the participants. They were trying to work to get a better city. We began to exchange information: their views, what they were looking for, what they need from us. Everything followed after that.
We never used outside consultants. We also talked to our colleagues in other cities and tried to learn from their experiences to see what we could do and what we could share in order to move forward. From day one we began to keep in touch with those individuals. I mentioned earlier the Apps4Ottawa contest we had. We said we would like to launch apps for our contest; what do you recommend for categories, prizes, judging panels, etc.? From day one, they continued to exchange information. We never used outside consultants. We used the residents. That's how we did it.