CMUA spokesperson wants public utilities to be exempted from SB 272

Gil Topete, Director for Energy and spokesperson for the California Municipal Utilities Association (CMUA), which opposed the passage of SB 272 on the grounds that it would make sensitive operational information too accessible to would-be cyber-intruders, said today that his organization would be continuing its opposition and working to modify it even though the bill passed the California Assembly Local Government Committee on a 7-0 vote on July 15^th and now goes to the Assembly Appropriations Committee for further consideration, in order to achieve these goals: (1) Taking public utilities out of the bill entirely; (2) Failing that, not making them display the sensitive data on their web sites; and (3) At least leaving out information identifying a locality’s “enterprise systems”  custodian, which he feels would make it easier to target the system itself with malicious intent.

He strongly believes that the disclosure requirements contained in this bill, authored by California State Senator Robert M. Hertzberg, would increase the potential for abuse.

“We’re just trying to deliver electricity and water to our customers.  Leave us out of it,” Topete said.  Some of the items, he continued “shouldn’t be anybody’s business, and if they are, then they shouldn’t be as easily available as by a single click.”

SB 272 passes policy committee in Assembly; SB 450 consideration is postponed until 2016

SB 272, a bill authored by California State Senator Robert M. Hertzberg that would require county and municipal governments throughout the state to perform an inventory leading to a catalog of their “enterprise systems,” was approved  today on a 7-0 vote by the California Assembly Local Government Committee.

According to a press release issued today by the Senator’s office, “no actual records will be included in the catalog.”

Also according to that statement,

“Within California’s 58 counties and nearly 500 cities, there are thousands of agencies that collect and store public information.

“Hertzberg said his goal for SB 272 and open data in the long term is to better harness the power of locally generated data to help spur economic growth, tackle major infrastructure issues and set millions of Californians on a path toward upward mobility. Properly gathered and clearly understood, data could also help empower local agencies and encourage the agencies to work together more effectively and to intelligently allocate resources to better deliver public services, he said.

”‘Smarter governments work better and inspire confidence in those they serve, strengthening the connection between government and the people,’ Hertzberg said.”

Implementing this process would facilitate subsequent inventories of, and access to, the data itself, using something like the Microsoft Azure Data Catalog, which is, according to Joseph Sirosh, corporate VP of Information Management and Machine Learning at Microsoft:

“a fully managed service that stores, describes, indexes and provides information on how to access any registered data source. It closes the gap between those seeking information and those producing it."

During a conference call today, a representative  of Microsoft said that the data corpus created by applying Azure Data Cloud to find and catalog government data sources could easily be analyzed using the recently-released Microsoft Cortana Analytics program to discover actionable insights that could lead to the results promised by Senator Hertzberg. 

The Microsoft representative further mentioned that it’s not just governmental organizations where resistance to modernizing data processing systems arises from politics generated by those who want to maintain control of their own “stovepiped” data.  So winning approval for such a system must necessarily require substantial investment in understanding and addressing the concerns of those who control legacy data sources and access to still-generating streams of data constantly being created by government at the state and local levels.

Full and free access to (most) government data using the cloud

Combining the SB 272-mandated “enterprise systems” data base with tools like Azure Data Catalog and Cortana Analytics would “empower local agencies” and allow, in Hertzberg’s words:  “agencies to work together more effectively and to intelligently allocate resources to better deliver public services.”

Creating such a platform would also enable ordinary citizens, as well as government workers at all levels, to easily find and examine data from a comprehensive collection of government sources from any place with an Internet connection.

Of course, deciding what data held by the government is too sensitive for any reason to be released to the public (by any means) is an on-going issue, and one that can be expected to intensify as access to government data becomes a more prominent issue itself and more people understand the potential of powerful cloud computing tools to put them in close touch with what their government is up to.

GovView as a 6-D’s phenomenon

As Peter Diamandis, founder of the XPrize competitions, frequently points out in his explanation of the “6 D’s of exponential growth,” technological innovation involves six major characteristics.  Exponential growth emerges in a form, he says, that is “digitized, deceptive (in that it starts slowly), disruptive, dematerialized, demonetized, and democratized.”

Digitizing official government data was the first step on this path.  SB 272 is deceptively only a small step further.  Giving everyone access to government data is certain to disrupt existing data food chains, and is likely to be resisted by some of those who control and want to continue to control the flow of information into and out of government.  Creating an integrated Azure Data Catalog with Cortana Analytics platform whose core data subsumes all available official state and local government data would effectively dematerialize the process of getting information from and about the government.  Once the system is in place, the marginal cost of further inquiries is so low as to virtually demonetize the process.  This virtually-free access to official texts and other files in a form that is most accessible to the user effectively democratizes the data.  Thus there occurs an exponential increase in access to data and, possibly, of civil engagement fueled by that access.

According to the press release from Hertzberg’s office:  “SB 272 now faces review by the Assembly Appropriations Committee. No hearing date has yet been set.”

Hertzberg’s office also confirmed that another bill in the Senator’s legislative portfolio, SB 450, which would have substantially re-vamped the way Californians vote, is being held over until the next session of the Legislature, beginning in January, 2016, to allow for further public discussion of the bill and its new framework for elections.

Create an integrated Open Gov/Open Data application for California and beyond

Having tried since 1994 to bring government up to the highest levels  of computerized operation, my latest efforts revolve around legislation now pending in the California Legislature to partially rationalize and integrate the data collection, processing, storage, and release operations of the state and local governments.

            Now pending in Sacramento are bills that would require local governments to make their collected data available to users in formats that can be easily understood  (SB 169); require local government entities to prepare an inventory of their “enterprise” data and the IT systems that supports them (SB 272); and mandate a transition of neighborhood voting stations into an all-mail ballot model complemented by dropoff boxes and vote centers connected to the VoteCal computerized statewide registration database  (SB 450).

            Within these bills is the germ of an idea:  that local and state governments and bureaucracies can integrate their data systems into a fully-functioning, cloud-based, 21^st century network that will allow easy use by government officials and ordinary users.

            The movement to gain easy public access to government records goes under the name “Open Gov.”  California could take the national lead on this issue by passing these bills and then moving rapidly to design and implement a comprehensive data management system that would connect all government computers in the state in one interoperative network and which would be structured in a way that gives public users easy access to the data hosted by this network.

            The long time it has taken to get the VoteCal system up and running testifies to the difficulties in bringing government up to contemporary data processing standards.  But the time and money that would need to be invested in building an integrated state data system would be amply repaid by subsequent efficiencies and cost-savings, and improved performance based on the ability to access and analyze in real-time the data held by the government.
           
Parsing the Law and Making it Intelligible

            Judicata is a legal analytics start-up whose efforts, according to its CEO, “are around parsing the core information that is in the case law and then building tools around that.”

            Adding the data analytics capabilities of Judicata and similar companies to a corpus of data accessible via the Web from all California state and local government as well as from legislative monitoring sites like LegiScan would allow for the creation of a system that could read, parse, semantically understand, and output in plain language answers to questions about existing law, pending law, and government policies and regulations.

            For more about the advantages of having computers parse and explain law in plain language, look at “Is it good enough for the law to be written for lawyers?”..  

            Parts of the federal government, like the National Security Agency, know a lot about hacking computer systems.  Others, like the Office of Personnel Management, apparently not so much.  Why not assign experts from this government spy agency, whose stock-in-trade is violating personal privacy in the search for potentially useful data, to instruct and advise those in the government whose job it is, inter alia, to  protect private and personal information from hostile attacks.  After all, it takes a thief…

            Meanwhile, creating an integrated network of government data centers whose data can be queried by ordinary users and used for machine learning by powerful artificial intelligence to surface actionable insights leading to increased governmental efficiency and better outcomes for everyone would be a worthwhile use of government funds and technical resources, opening up new vistas for Open Government and Open Data.

            Passing SB 169, SB 272, and SB 450 could be the first steps on a swift path to this future.

California tries legislatively to upgrade its state-county computer communications

At a time when the federal government is becoming renowned for its data-handling ineptitude, California State Senator Robert M. Hertzberg is working through the legislative process to modestly upgrade the digital infrastructure connecting state and county data and IT operations.

Most prominently, he’s the author of SB 450, which would adopt and adapt the Colorado Model of all-mail voting complemented by dropoff boxes and vote centers that are accessible to voters throughout a county, who would no longer be constrained to vote only in their own residential neighborhood, but who could do so more conveniently near their work, their children’s school, or other locations within their county of residence. 

SB 450 will be heard on Wednesday, July 15^th, in the Assembly Elections and Reapportionment Committee.  Ray Sotero, press spokesperson for Senator Hertzberg, told Etopia News this afternoon, “We hope it will pass,” sounding as though he thought it would.  He said that there would be a vote on this bill in the committee on the fifteenth.

This Colorado Model system, which includes same-day registration, requires compatibility and communication between the individual counties voter registrar databases and the recently-launched-into-testing VoteCal statewide registered voter data base.  This “electronic poll book” feature is an example of the more general issue of the need for overall state-county digital compatibility.

Also included in Senator Hertzberg’s current bill portfolio is SB 169, an “open government” bill which would require all local agencies to make their publicly-available data available online in formats accessible to ordinary users.  This bill was passed by the Senate Judiciary Committee on a 7-0 vote, and is now pending at the Senate Appropriations Committee.

In another effort to upgrade the digital infrastructure, Senator Hertzberg is the author of SB 272, which would require each county to prepare an inventory of its “enterprise” data for a state-wide catalog of such information.  That bill is scheduled to be heard in the Assembly Local Government Committee on Wednesday, July 15^th.  Mr. Sotero wasn’t as certain that there would be a vote on this bill at that time.

At a time when digital security, public accessibility of government records and operations, new and emerging communications marvels, and efficiency, accountability, and transparency in government are all coming to the fore, it’s somewhat comforting to know that at  least someone in Sacramento is thinking and acting about bringing them all together in a synergistic and democratizing way, even if, for now, these efforts are only working at the edges of the overall problem of bringing California’s governmental digital infrastructure and operations into the 21^st century in a profound and perhaps disruptive transformation. 

As the language of SB 272 acknowledges:

“California plays a vitally important role in moving our nation forward in the world of technology.  Just as the state’s thriving tech industry surges ahead in setting new standards for society, so too must California.”

You can read the bill in its entirety here. 

These are small steps.  The state ought to rationalize and inter-connect all the local and county and state agencies and start applying modern data analysis to uncover actionable insights that will improve government efficiency and improve outcomes for all Californians.

It’s too late in the legislative cycle to the get that done this session, but there’s always next year, which should give the tech titans and others plenty of time to design new and better ways of doing the government’s business using the newest viable technologies.

SB 450 Working Group reaches consensus, sends work product to legislators

For weeks, the SB 450 Working Group, made up of representatives of the California Secretary of State, state legislators, county election officials, and public advocacy groups, has been meeting via conference call to hash out specific recommendations for this bill, which would abolish local polling stations in California and replace them with an all-mail ballot, complemented with vote centers and ballot dropoff boxes.  The bill is currently pending in the California State Assembly Elections and Redistricting Committee and is scheduled to be heard there on July 15^th.  

One member of that Working Group (WG) is Orange County Registrar of Voters Neal Kelley, who today told Etopia News that the group had completed its work at a meeting on June 2^nd, and had submitted it to legislative counsel in Sacramento for disposition at the will of the legislators.  The final form of the bill will be determined by the Elections and Redistricting Committee, after which, if it passes, it will go to the full Assembly for consideration and then back to the Senate for concurrence.  If it passes over all these hurdles, it will be up to Governor Brown to sign it into law, or not, as he sees fit.

According to Kelley, who is also the President of the California Association of Clerks and Election Officials (CACEO), here’s what was recommended by the SB 450 Working Group::

For general and primary elections, there should be one vote center for every 30,000 registered voters in the county and this location should be open for 10 days prior to “e-day,” what used to be called “Election Day.”  On e-day itself, there should be one vote center for every 15,000 registered voters.  There also should be a minimum of four vote centers in each county.

As for the drop boxes, there should be one for every 15,000 registered voters in the county, again with a minimum of four.  Since mail-in ballots will be sent to voters 29 days before e-day, the WG recommended that the dropboxes be available 28 days prior to Election Day.

These are the numbers for general and primary elections.  For special elections, the WG recommended one vote center for every 60,000 registered voters, to be open 10 days before e-day, and one for every 30,000 registered voters on e-day itself.

There is nothing in the recommendations, nor is there expected to be anything in the bill itself, about who will pay for instituting these changes.  According to Registrar of Voters Kelley, the Secretary of State, Alex Padilla, has “made a verbal commitment” about providing some state funding separate from this bill.  But, as things stand now, all such costs are to be borne by the individual counties.