Partner's Perspective: NNIP and Open Data in Pittsburgh

The call is growing louder for governments to embrace open data principles. The hope is that greater transparency will engage residents, increase accountability and spur new private uses of data. As a National Neighborhood Indicators Partnership member, the University Center for Social and Urban Research at the University of Pittsburgh has long provided data for community use. They now help to build a constituency for open data and encourage local governments to publish data online. Political leaders, civic developers, and philanthropists are also showing a growing interest, and the emerging cross-sector collaborations have the potential to improve open data policy and practice.