Our pursuit of innovation
Infrastructure Week - a national week of attention dedicated to elevating infrastructure as a critical issue impacting everyone - is this week.
In Syracuse, improving infrastructure is one of Mayor Miner’s top priorities, and if you have followed this blog, you will know that the innovation team has focused its efforts on infrastructure for more than a year. Our infrastructure report, detailing the work done so far, is available here.
There’s been a lot of talk about “poverty” in Syracuse lately. National reports have identified Syracuse as owning one of the highest rates of poverty in the country – and according to one study, the highest rates of concentrated poverty among Blacks and Latinos. This national attention has provided a necessary shock to the system. Business, political, and community leaders are rallying around the issue of poverty (and concentrated poverty) more than ever before. New York State, meanwhile, has commissioned anti-poverty initiatives in Syracuse, along with several other Upstate cities, where similar dynamics of concentrated poverty are prevalent. For those of us who have long been working in the low-income communities of Syracuse, this is all welcome. For us to really move the needle on poverty, it must become a community priority. However, in order to “do something about poverty”, we must be committed to a deeper understanding of the issue and strategies that lead to real and lasting change.
Our Department of Neighborhood and Business Development launched, in partnership with Code for America, business.syrgov.net. We wrote about the site previously, and in this post will walk through some of the site’s backend, technical details.
When we started our Economic Opportunity research, transportation access was a major theme that arose. It’s hard to find or keep work if you can’t get there. All of the members of our team have cars and drive to work, so transportation challenges aren't something that we typically experience. So we decided to take the bus to see what public transit in Syracuse was really like.
Today, we are excited to release the City of Syracuse’s Open Data Policy. This policy is different because we are asking you to comment on it before it is made official. Visit this site https://documents.mymadison.io/docs/city-of-syracuse-open-data-policy and state your support or opposition. Additionally, you can comment or leave notes so the policy can be changed where appropriate.
Today, the City of Syracuse is excited to announce the launch of its Business Portal, now live at business.syrgov.net.
