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APDU Weekly

This is a special “free” version of APDU Weekly. Once per quarter, this member-only publication is released to non-members as well. Enjoy today’s edition, the last of 2013.

 

Feature

 

 

APDU Election Results
By vote of the APDU membership, Steve Pierson, American Statistical Association, and Cliff Cook, City of Cambridge, Massachusetts, will serve as At-Large members of the APDU Board of Directors for 2014.  Pierson returns for another one-year term, while Cook joins the board for the first time.

 

Data Innovation Day 2014, January 23, 2014
APDU is a partner along with Data.gov, AMD, Google, Sunlight Foundation, and others for this one-day virtual conference raising awareness about the benefits and opportunities that come from increased use of information by individuals and the public and private sector.  APDU will be proving tools for members to contact legislators in early January. Watch the Advocacy section on the APDU site for details.
 

News

 

Comment on Draft Bill to Allow IRS to Share Data with BLS and BEA

On November 20, the Senate Finance Committee released draft language for tax administrative reform, including text that would allow the Internal Revenue Service to share tax returns with the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Bureau of Economic Analysis for statistical purposes.  Feedback on the tax administration discussion draft is requested by January 17, 2014.

 

Recommitment to Making Agencies More Open
One of the commitments included in the latest plan the US released as part of its participation in the international Open Government Partnership could help refocus agency attention on open government plans and make government information more easily available to the public.

 

Open Data in Action
The Governance Lab (The GovLab) —a research institution at New York University—released the beta version of its Open Data 500 project—an initiative designed to identify, describe, and analyze companies that use open government data in order to study how these data can serve business needs more effectively.

 

Can We Protect Student Privacy in the Age of Education Data?
Concerns about student privacy have led to heated debates about how much data schools should be collecting, how it should be stored and who should have access to it.

 

Sign On to The Census Project Letter to Senate
The Census Project, a coalition of stakeholder organizations dedicated to a fair and accurate census, is sending a letter to leaders of the Senate Appropriations Committee, urging them to support the President’s budget request for the U.S. Census Bureau. APDU has signed onto this letter.  To sign on, email Jason Shevrin by December 20, 2014.

 

New & Updated Data Sources

 

Find Stats for Your Neighborhood with the Census Bureau’s New Interactive Map
The U.S. Census Bureau released Census Explorer, a new interactive map that gives users easier access to neighborhood-level statistics.

 

TIGERweb 4.0 Release
TIGERweb v4.0 viewer and streaming map services now have new boundaries and features from the 2013 American Community Survey (ACS13) benchmark, which include updates as of May 2013.  The TIGERweb 2010 application has been renamed TIGERweb Decennial and now also includes Census 2000 geographic data.

 

Air Pollution in USA: Real-time Air Quality Index Visual Map
The pollution indices and color codes available on this web site follow the EPA graduation.

 

Visualization of the Week

 

Gizmodo, the design and technology blog for Gawker Media, presents a rundown of the best infographics and data visualizations of 2013. Not all are based primarily on public data, but showcase the strengths of the medium just the same. Want more? Check out Cool Hunting’s Information is Beautiful Award Winners for 2013.

 

Notable Data Publications

 

GOVERNMENT

NONPROFITS & FOUNDATIONS

  • Brookings – Map: Income Taxes in Your County
  • Council on State Taxation – The Best and Worst of State Tax Administration
  • Kaiser Family Foundation – Characteristics of Poor Uninsured Adults who Fall into the Coverage Gap
  • Kaiser Family Foundation – The Impact of the Coverage Gap in States not Expanding Medicaid by Race and Ethnicity
  • Monitoring the Future – American Teens More Cautious About Using Synthetic Drugs
  • Monitoring the Future – Teen Smoking Continues to Decline in 2013
  • Pew Research Center – International Migrants by Country
  • Public Library of Science –