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Los Angeles City Hall has just named its first chief data officer, Abhi Nemani. Appointed by Mayor Eric Garcetti, Nemani is to manage the city’s open data initiatives, including its open data portal https://data.lacity.org/. Los Angeles’ open data platform tracks information on everything from city employee salaries to tonnage of solid waste collected, and has been a developing initiative of the Mayor’s over the past 12 months.
"Data has the power to transform the daily lives of LA residents and visitors. Knowing where your money is going, where a parking space is available, and where an event is taking place puts information into the hands of those who need it most," said Nemani in a statement. "Mayor Garcetti is committed to opening city data for innovators and users everywhere, and I'm thrilled to join his team to help him get there."
Of Nemani’s new appointment Mayor Garcetti said, "I'm pleased that Abhi Nemani is joining my team to manage the collection of data citywide and create tools to use data that will help solve everyday challenges for our residents."
The appointment of a chief data officer represents a new phase in Los Angeles’ open data project. Launched slowly, in October 2013 as a window into city financial data collected from the Los Angeles Controller’s office, it was later expanded in December of 2013 to include information from other City of LA departments. Yet, until this point no single person was commissioned to manage the open data platform. Previously, chief innovation technology officer Peter Marx was overseeing the effort in addition to his other technology duties.
Upon its launch, the platform featured over 100 data sets and City Hall has been working to increase publically available data by searching out information stuck within proprietary computer systems. Chief innovation officer Marx had indicated that this often required new thinking from city employees that were not used to sharing their internal data publically. It will be Nemani’s responsibility to continue that push to publish internal data.
Los Angeles’ open data platform has been part of Mayor Garcetti’s outreach efforts to the LA tech community and is part of his ‘Back to Basics’ campaign which is focusing on City Hall performance in a number of fundamental government functions.
Before accepting the chief data officer position Nemani was the co-executive director of Code for America, a non-profit dedicated to improving the government’s use of technology. Nemani will work under the Office of Budget and Innovation, headed by Deputy Mayor Rick Cole. He will start work for the City of Los Angeles September 2.
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