Evidence of meeting #47 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was data.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
Has there been an effort at the state level and the muncipal level to enter into open government?
Professor of Law, As an Individual
As you may or may not have heard, my successor, if you will, the new United States deputy chief technology officer, with focus now on public sector innovation and open government, is actually the former CIO of the city and county of San Francisco. He has been one of the leaders in the municipal open government movement. He is one of the convenors of--I've forgotten the acronym; there are too many acronyms and not enough time in government--a new organization for global municipal e-government where cities around the world are now convening.
Some of the best innovations are actually coming at the municipal level as well as at the state level. New York State, where I'm at home, announced an open New York plan. The Senate of New York created the first citizen commenting tool for commenting on legislation at the state level prior to its enactment. There is a lot of work that is really bubbling up at the state and local levels.
In particular, I participate in a bi-weekly conference call on municipal open government, just to keep track of it. Every two weeks someone new is added to it. We report to one another on some of the initiatives that are going on at the local, state, or the .org levels in service of municipal-level and state-level open government.
There are also grants and new funding programs, both from companies as well as from the federal government, to try to promote innovation in governance at the local and state levels. ONB has some money in back of that. IBM has something like a $50 million prize purse for the City Forward initiative that it's investing in in local-level and state-level open government efforts.
If anything, whereas the President's day-one memo kicked it all off, you're seeing more activity happening at the local and state levels faster around the world than even at the federal level.
Conservative
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Shawn Murphy
Thank you very much, Ms. Davidson.
That concludes the first round of seven minutes each. We're going to go now to the second round and the time will be reduced to five minutes.
We're going to go back to the opposition Liberal Party, and the committee member will be Mr. Wayne Easter. Mr. Easter, you have five minutes.
Liberal
Wayne Easter Liberal Malpeque, PE
Thank you, folks, for your assistance and your presentations.
You talked about customer-driven, Mr. Ferriero, I think it was--no, it was Ms. Noveck--that you depended on public input. How did you gain that public input? Was it through interactive Internet feedback? What was the process that you used to find out what the public was thinking and what the most important areas to address first were?
Professor of Law, As an Individual
I think I could probably speak to this issue.
First, let me say that when we started the White House open government initiative, we thought it would be apropos to actually be open about the process of making an open government policy. For the very first time, we started by asking public sector workers what we should be doing and what the challenges are that they're facing. I think it was the first time that anyone had consulted—again, using online tools, to answer your question about the method—not cabinet secretaries for official departmental-level opinion, but they actually asked the line workers in the federal government what they thought.
We then turned to a process that is documented online in the first anniversary report of open government on the whitehouse.gov/open website. We started a process of actually using free online tools and experimented to consult with the public. It was then improved on and followed by the National Archives in the work they did on engaging the public in the public interest declassification board process of trying to think about declassification policy. It has been replicated again and again and improved on again and again. In every case, we used online tools to try to hear from new voices and get new ideas.
But let me be clear that it takes time to effect this type of culture change. I think we've been more successful with public sector workers. As for getting the public involved, we've had tremendous success, but it's not enough yet, because it's such a big sea change for government to not only ask questions but to really care about the answers, take it seriously, and act on the answers in the way that I think this process has set in motion. The more we do it and the more we practise doing it, I think the greater the level of engagement in participation will be, the more seriously people will take it, and the better the quality of the suggestions will be.
In addition, I think the launch of challenge.gov, a challenge platform, and new legislation from Congress, as well as policy from the White House, set out and made it clear to agencies that they should think about using prizes as a mechanism to get people involved in governance, in solving problems, and in coming up with solutions. Actually offering those prizes is a way of getting people engaged.
Lastly, on the revamp of the Federal Register that the archivist described, I think the transformation from a document written for lawyers to a document that's now written in plain English, accessible to regular people, and that even has pictures and is searchable really helps people learn about the opportunities to participate.
That was a long way of saying this is a culture change that's unfolding over time. I think it's getting better as we go along. Taking advantage of new media that is free and doesn't have an impact on budgets at all to actually get at new ideas faster is something that's really exciting and heartening.
Liberal
Wayne Easter Liberal Malpeque, PE
I'm practically out of time. I wonder if the others could comment on that, as well.
On the other side of that, was there a considerable amount of financing required by the federal government in terms of the technology and in terms of changing the culture? What problems or barriers would you run into with departments in terms of getting them to basically move to this more open government? What barriers would you run into?
Director, Office of Information Policy, United States Department of Justice
I can take that one.
I think one of the ways to be successful in doing this is to first of all recognize that it's not easy. Open government requires a balance. There is a balance of competing interests.
It's natural for agencies to sometimes feel reluctant or to say their types of records are different, what they do is different, and there can't be openness on what they do because it's so sensitive. You have to walk people through what can be an initial resistance. They need to recognize that even though there's sensitive information that is properly protected and will be protected, everyone has room within their record systems and within the things they do. Everyone has room to be more open. Everyone can make a little progress.
Once you get it started, it helps to be able to point to another agency and say the CIA has actually managed to declassify and post some really interesting things. If the CIA can do it, they can do it too.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Shawn Murphy
Mr. Easter's time is up, so we're going to go back to the Conservative Party and Mr. Jim Abbott.
You have five minutes, Mr. Abbott.
Conservative
Jim Abbott Conservative Kootenay—Columbia, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
My attack to this has always been from the perspective of whether we are working in a bubble. In other words, under this initiative by the President, how quick was the take-up by the population at large, and not the people we affectionately call geeks, or people who don't have a life, or don't come up out of the dark, or whoever? The average person walking through Times Square, I guess is what I'm trying to say. How quickly was there a take-up? And in fact has there been a take-up?
National Archivist, United States National Archives and Records Administration
I'll respond to that one first.
It's clear that all the social media tools and all the avenues we have created for those folks in Times Square to access us have paid off. We have opened up the records of the country to new audiences through Facebook, my own blog, ten different blogs, and massive amounts of photographs on Flickr.
Folks who have never had any connection with the National Archives are now finding us and using us in ways they never have before. So I would say it's had a huge impact on the number of new audiences attracted to the archives.
Professor of Law, As an Individual
I think that's right.
Oh, go ahead. Sorry.
Director, Office of Information Policy, United States Department of Justice
I was just going to say really quickly that one of my favourite examples is Admiral Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who established a Twitter account, and he has hundreds of thousands of followers on that account. So I think it's a fascinating example of the public being directly connected with a principal government official in a brand-new way.
Professor of Law, As an Individual
It was always the bane of my existence that the Department of Justice had 300,000 Twitter followers and I only had 150,000 Twitter followers. So I think you are right that the average people on the street haven't heard of open government, nor frankly should they have heard of open government. Open government really just describes the way we ought to be working in order to be more effective at what we do.
People care about specific issues, for the most part. They're interested in reviewing patents, or in being a citizen archivist, or in getting information or participating in an environmental project about clean air or clean water. So what we're trying to do is to facilitate a multiplicity of opportunities for participation.
It's worth taking a look, though, at the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project, which did some survey work last year about the interaction of people with open government data. And there were some startling numbers, like 40% of people had actually downloaded a government data set in one way or another. So it was really quite remarkable how many people, just through word of mouth, had essentially benefited from or were interacting with this process.
But I think for the most part this movement will have been successful if no one has ever heard of it but they feel engaged and are participating in the life of their democracy in one way or another. And there are some new data back from Pew that just came out yesterday to this effect, which I would commend to you, that again show that the culture change is under way even if the initiative or the brand name isn't well known, or people know it as WeGov, or Gov 2.0, or opengov. It doesn't really matter what we call it.
Conservative
Jim Abbott Conservative Kootenay—Columbia, BC
Thank you.
And very quickly, just because of the time, I'd appreciate a couple of 30-second comments if you have anything you'd like to say about the issue of security of the information. In other words, of this additional information appearing, what are the concerns that you happen to...? You're not security experts, but in your judgment, how has the system to this point been able to respond to security and the revealing, in fact, of too much information?
National Archivist, United States National Archives and Records Administration
As the nation's record-keeper, I worry about it all the time. And we are now very rapidly moving from a paper environment to an all-electronic environment, with every agency in the government and the White House creating its records electronically. And the security issue is one of my largest concerns, the issue of ensuring that information is protected. I think every agency in the government is concerned about that.
Professor of Law, As an Individual
Open government data specifically did not focus on national-security-related information, in order to not have to confront this serious problem. It is a serious problem, but we wanted to focus on a culture change that allowed people to work on getting out data that was, as someone said, low-hanging fruit--the data that was easy to get out to help empower people in their own communities, first and foremost.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Shawn Murphy
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Abbott.
Now we'll go back to our representative from the Bloc Québécois, Madame Thi Lac.
Bloc
Ève-Mary Thaï Thi Lac Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.
Thank you for sharing your expertise with us by videoconference and especially for answering the many questions our committee might have.
Your government is often held up as an example of one that is implementing a transparent government. I have two questions for all the witnesses.
Would you say that the implementation process has been successful or is it still in the initial phases? What are the strengths, weaknesses and particularly the limits of the current open government initiative in the United States?
Director, Office of Information Policy, United States Department of Justice
I think it has definitely been successful, in that we have seen a dramatic increase in material available on websites. Backlogs are being reduced, and more material is being released. But I hasten to add that there's much more work to be done. We're just at the beginning of this journey, or it's the first step on the road. I think it will definitely be an ongoing effort to continue the process. As Beth was mentioning, at the beginning people are looking for low-hanging fruit--you're trying to find the easy things that you can release and post. Over time it will be harder to sustain the momentum and continue to find ways to be more transparent.
We still have many challenges ahead of us, but we're off to a really good start. The whole idea is to maintain the focus and keep encouraging agencies to do even better than they have in the past.
National Archivist, United States National Archives and Records Administration
I would agree with Melanie that it has been successful. What convinces me and supports me in thinking about the future is that we have now raised expectations among the American public about access to government, and they're going to be driving us. They're going to be looking for more, and we're going to have to deliver. So it's a very exciting time.
Chief Digital Access Strategist, United States National Archives and Records Administration
I'd like to add that staff are getting more comfortable with openness in government. As we work on social media projects in which they get involved, if they do a blog post or start tweeting, they get to a comfort level and a trust is built between them, among each other and the public. I think that will continue to build so it becomes part of the culture.
We said something about the momentum. I think that will become part of the process, so I don't think we'll be turning back any time soon.
Professor of Law, As an Individual
I think that's true, and I would strongly support what the other witnesses have said about the success and really the momentum. To me, the greatest success is the fact that there is a community that has been created with representation across every agency of people who are working on and care about this issue and are taking it back into their own agencies and building a culture of innovation in their agencies. For every person who comes to the inter-agency committee meeting, there are another dozen or two dozen or hundred people managing the process back in the agencies who are empowered.
Let me speak to the limits really quickly. By no means are we there yet. Policy is still largely made behind closed doors within that bubble that was talked about. This is something that is going to change over time as we develop these more productive and collaborative relationships.
People don't participate yet. To the question that was asked earlier about we're building it and are they coming, I think that's still something evolving as people are learning, not just within government but outside of government, that there is this opportunity to engage and to take it seriously and that they'll be listened to.
We need far better tools than we have. If we want to get people to engage or collaborate with them, we don't yet really have in government tools for effective participation. We also are dealing with huge manual backlogs of information, whether it's in the classification space or the patent space or the FOIA space. There's a great need and there's a shift now towards new technologies that will enable faster processing of these enormous backlogs to get to transparency faster.
There's also the question of how we start to create data in a digital open format from the get-go, so changing so much about the legacy systems and culture, which means not just trying to work backwards but to actually go forward and start to build openness and collaboration into how public sector institutions work. It's still one of the great challenges but also one of the great opportunities that I think is in front of us.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Shawn Murphy
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Ms. Thi Lac.
We're now going to go back to a member of the governing Conservative Party.
Mr. Ed Holder, you have five minutes.