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Niterói, Brazil

Data-Driven Investment Benefits Youth and the City of Niterói

Project Type:
Youth Development, Community Engagement

At a Glance

In 2013,  Niterói developed its first strategic plan, Niterói Que Queremos (The Niterói We Want), with online contributions from about 5,700 residents. The plan, with goals set until 2033, includes indicators that strengthen the city’s ability to monitor, evaluate, and improve public policies.

Niterói was among the first cities in Brazil to establish a Digital Government Strategy by decree in December 2022. Today, 100% of administrative processes are handled electronically.

Niterói is the first city in Brazil to conduct a large-scale municipal household sample survey. Beginning in 2025, the Niterói Que Somos (The Niterói We Are) survey will interview 15,000 households across all city regions and will be repeated every four years.

Niterói has won first place four times and received the highest score twice in Transparency Rankings from the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Office of the Comptroller General. The city’s Transparency Portal allows the public to track government spending and resource allocation.

Many things need to happen for a young person in a vulnerable situation to achieve the dream of attending college: years of study, support from family and teachers, and financial resources or scholarships. But for the youth of Niterói, data analysis is being used to implement public policies for social inclusion and shorten that path.

By analyzing information on public safety and education, the Niterói City Hall found that young people from more vulnerable neighborhoods needed more support to develop professional skills. Based on this data, the Niterói Jovem EcoSocial Program was developed to offer free professional training to young people aged 16 to 24 living in socially vulnerable areas. The program has a dual purpose: increasing youth employability and promoting the city’s environmental sustainability. The initiative is continuously monitored, closely tracking participants to assess its effectiveness and demonstrate the impact of education in reducing violence.

Image Courtesy of the City of Niterói.

Walking through the communities impacted by EcoSocial shows that we have planted ideas of preservation and sustainability in the minds and hearts of young people in our city. More than that, we have contributed to their education and professional development, and we hope they will share their knowledge and do good in their communities.

Octávio Ribeiro, Municipal Secretary of Social Participation

The Bloomberg Philanthropies What Works Cities Certification is, above all, an incentive—something that drives us to organize, modernize, and continually improve our strategies using technology and data analysis. We have earned certifications, recognition, and awards that show we are on the right path, investing in innovative initiatives like the Niterói Jovem EcoSocial Program. This is a concrete example of how well-structured policies, supported by technology and evidence, can transform lives.

Mayor Rodrigo Neves

900 young people from vulnerable neighborhoods have participated in the Jovem EcoSocial Program since 2019. Another 600 are currently enrolled in the third phase, expected to graduate in the first half of 2026.

Participants choose from a variety of classes and engage in field activities that develop their skills and contribute to their communities, such as assisting in reforestation and establishing community gardens. Since 2019, more than 900 young people have graduated from the program.

Jhonata Barcelos was part of the first EcoSocial cohort and received a job offer related to the courses he took in the program upon graduating in 2021. “A person is not born a professional,” he said. “They develop professionally. Who I am in my career today is 50% thanks to what EcoSocial provided me and 50% my own effort.”

The City continues to follow EcoSocial participants even after they complete the program, using outcome data to improve future editions, such as expanding the neighborhoods served and diversifying the courses offered. A strong culture of monitoring within the municipal government allows city management to evaluate what is working, what needs adjustment, and the progress made toward Niterói’s 20-year plan to become the best city to live in Brazil.

In 2023, Barcelos was accepted into the State University of Rio de Janeiro. He credits the EcoSocial program with opening the first door that allowed him to fulfill his dream of attending college. Through its commitment to data analysis, Niterói is creating more pathways to long-term success for Barcelos and hundreds of other young people.

More than 45,000 families receive the Arariboia Social Currency, an electronic currency that not only provides government benefits but also supports local businesses and encourages employment and school attendance.

Image Courtesy of the City of Niterói.

In recent years, Niterói has made great strides in the strategic use of data for decision-making, policy formulation, and evaluation of public policies. Now, Niterói is innovating by launching Brazil’s first municipal household sample survey, Niterói que Somos. With it, we will have even greater capacity to improve our planning and develop more effective public policies based on detailed population data.

Isadora Modesto, Secretary of Planning
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Calgary, Canada

Make it Personal: How Calgary Is Supporting Residents to Take Climate Action.

Project Type:
Energy, Environment, Infrastructure and Utilities, Technology

At a Glance

The residential solar calculator helps Calgarians understand the potential for solar energy generation in their home. It provides an estimate of energy cost savings, greenhouse gas reductions and the investment payback period. This data supports Calgarians to make informed decisions on energy use in their home.

Applied advanced analytics to map data, 3D building models and energy costs to create a residential solar calculator tailored for Calgary households—an in-house solution that contributed to a doubling of the city’s residential solar installations in 2023.

48,000 visits to the online residential solar calculator, with 65% returning users, which shows high engagement from residents.

The importance of harnessing the power of the sun is clear. Worldwide, extreme weather events have increased fivefold since 1970 and 2024 was Canada’s costliest year on record for weather-related disasters. Calgary, Canada’s sunniest city, enjoying approximately 333 days of sun each year, and Canada’s fastest-growing metropolitan area with 1.68 million residents, recognizes that addressing climate change requires collective action. For individuals, it can be hard to know how to contribute. But The City of Calgary is empowering residents to act with a climate strategy that blends data, innovation and community engagement.

One standout initiative is Calgary’s Residential Solar Calculator. Launched in 2022, the online tool allows homeowners to assess their property’s solar potential. It uses LiDAR remote sensing and GIS mapping technology to account for roof tilt, orientation and shading and provides personalized solar insights for each Calgary residential address. The tool equips residents with vital knowledge to weigh the pros and cons of solar energy and engage with service providers confidently. The calculator educates homeowners on switching to solar energy, providing an estimated upfront cost and monthly energy savings. This information is crucial for determining whether solar energy is financially viable and how quickly the investment will pay off.

Calgary’s Residential Solar Calculator dashboard.

“Data analysis, visualization and data-supported stories play an incredibly important role in our climate work today and the climate work of tomorrow. We are using data to help us understand the complex nature of climate systems, identify patterns and trends, inform action and communicate with Calgarians.”

Dawn Smith, Manager, Governance & Reporting, Climate & Environment

To support Calgary’s broader greenhouse gas reduction goals, The City wants to generate more of its electricity needs within city boundaries from renewable sources. In 2023 alone, Calgary installed 16,000 kilowatts of residential solar PV—doubling the city’s capacity. During this time, more than 48,000 people have visited the calculator and almost two-thirds are return users, signaling high engagement. The popularity of the calculator highlights that there is an appetite from Calgarians to explore and understand the benefits of installing solar energy in their homes. By providing easily accessible, relevant and tailored information to homeowners, the residential solar calculator helps drive solar adoption indirectly through education and information sharing.

Supporting these efforts is Calgary’s comprehensive climate and environment dashboard, which tracks metrics and shares key program information with residents. This dashboard will ensure The City is transparent and accountable to its climate goals and outcomes by providing a comprehensive resource for the community to monitor results.

“Calgary is committed to embedding data and evidence into our decision-making processes. This approach ensures that taxpayer dollars are used effectively and that Calgary is a stronger and more resilient city, capable of facing future challenges.”

Mayor Jyoti Gondek

Climate change is a global challenge, but Calgary’s approach shows the power of solutions that involve government and residents. By making climate information more personalized and accessible to all, Calgary is not only addressing the crisis—it’s demonstrating its commitment to support its residents and setting a benchmark for other cities.

Calgary’s Climate and Environment dashboard.

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Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

A Bridge for the City’s Most Vulnerable

Project Type:
Community Engagement, Housing, Infrastructure

At a Glance

266,393 household surveys were carried out by the City’s Social Territories program to identify vulnerable families disconnected from municipal services.

3,758 out-of-school children and adolescents aged 4 to 14 were referred for enrollment.

9,744 families living in extreme poverty gained access to housing, healthcare and other social assistance through the Social Territories program.

About 2 million of Rio de Janeiro’s 6.2 million inhabitants live in favelas, residential areas spread across the City of Rio. These densely populated neighborhoods are often hard to reach, lack infrastructure and many families remain without access to basic services, disconnected from the sewage network, running water or electricity.

The first step to helping these families is to find them, as many of these residents are not part of government systems and there is little data about them. Thus, Rio City Hall decided to launch a new program, Social Territories, in partnership with UN-Habitat, the United Nations’ sustainable urban development program. With field agents who go door to door to interview families, the program’s priorities are to identify families at social risk and provide them with various basic public services, such as school enrollment, health care, referral to social benefits, housing support, and access to professional training and job opportunities. For example, Social Territories data helps the City choose beneficiaries of Casa Carioca, a housing requalification program.

Designed in 2016, Social Territories has proven the value of a three-phase, data-driven approach to helping some of Rio de Janeiro’s most vulnerable residents.

Image courtesy of the City of Rio de Janeiro.

In the first phase, municipal officials conduct interviews with residents to identify how they could help, whether by enrolling children in school, providing clean water or other support. Detailed household survey data is analyzed against standards defined in the UN Multidimensional Poverty Index. Levels of risk are established to indicate the degree of need of each household, which lays the groundwork for the second phase of the program. Using survey and geospatial data, municipal departments reach out to high-risk families, including those living in extreme poverty, to provide appropriate services such as housing, health care, education and job training. The final phase of Social Territories involves monitoring residents receiving targeted services and then reassessing their needs after a year.

In essence, the program aims to proactively learn about disconnected communities and build bridges between the City and residents to improve their lives. Administered by the Pereira Passos Institute, which oversees the City’s data practices and uses detailed demographic data to support the implementation of policies and programs, the Social Territories program has expanded over the years. Originally focused on 10 favelas, in 2022 the program expanded to cover all of Rio de Janeiro. That same year, it was recognized with a World Smart Cities Award.

“The Social Territories program serves all areas of City planning, identifying vulnerable families and increasingly promoting equity in access to services and opportunities.”

Bianca Medina, Coordinator of Social Territories at Instituto Pereira Passos

Today, Social Territories continues to show what can happen when a municipal government prioritizes data-driven decision-making to help its most vulnerable residents. In January 2025,

  • Almost 32,000 families identified by the program were served by the Municipal Health Department
  • Nearly 26,000 were served by Municipal Secretariat of Social Assistance
  • Almost 8,000 families received housing improvements, many of them through Casa Carioca Project
  • Nearly 4,000 children were recently enrolled in school
Image courtesy of the City of Rio de Janeiro.

“With the data made available by the Pereira Passos Institute from the field search, we can provide secretariats with information about families, improve the living conditions of the population, improve the efficiency of public management and promote sustainable urban development. It is an immense satisfaction to see the program happen and take shape in Rio.”, says Eduardo Paes, Mayor of Rio de Janeiro.

“When data drives our city’s services, we not only deliver results for our community, but we also rebuild trust with residents. What Works Cities Certification shows residents that we are making smart decisions that they can see and understand, making them partners in improving our city.”

Eduardo Paes, Mayor of Rio de Janeiro
Image courtesy of the City of Rio de Janeiro.

“Using data and evidence to run local government is more efficient. When you know where to invest and where the results come from, you save money.”

Lucas Padilha, Municipal Secretary of Culture
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Bogotá, Colombia

Bogotá’s Evidence-Based Approach to Empowering Caregivers

Project Type:
Community Engagement, Equity, Health and Wellbeing, Technology

At a Glance

The district administration built 21 Care Blocks, community centers that have provided support to more than 180,000 female caregivers and their families since January 2022.

Since its inception, the services of the Bogotá Care System have improved the lives of more than 546,500 women and their families. In 2023, it helped more than 550 women receive their high school diploma.

Through the Bogotá Public Innovation Laboratory – iBO, the Care Blocks are implementing new registration technology through a chatbot. The first stage managed to integrate more than 2,400 women to the system.

They successfully combined the use of data and feedback from residents to build a social support program that promotes economic mobility.

In a pioneering initiative aimed at supporting caregivers, Bogotá has successfully established 21 community centers throughout the city called Care Blocks.

During a visit from the What Works Cities Certification team to a Care Block in the Manitas neighborhood in the town of Ciudad Bolívar, which is considered a vulnerable area, the impact of the program was evident. As people danced and celebrated the Care Block’s third anniversary, caregivers expressed gratitude for the opportunity to receive support to improve their lives.

Care Blocks are designed to relieve the responsibilities and stress of caregiving. The goal is to allow caregivers to focus on other essential aspects of their lives that often get pushed aside due to their duties. All services provided are free, including community laundries. With these, more than 14,700 hours of care work were freed up for women, equivalent to 616 days.

According to the District Secretariat for Women, since January 2022, more than 180,000 female caregivers and their families have participated in the Care Blocks.

Image Courtesy of the City of Bogotá.

The District is actively involved in improving the program. Thanks to the Bogotá Public Innovation Laboratory – iBO, they are developing a system to register people in various activities offered in the Care Blocks, using a recently implemented chatbot to address queries and facilitate registrations. There are more than 2,100 engagements with the chatbot.

The results for residents and the emphasis of digitization and data have attracted the attention of leaders across the city and the country as a model to improve the lives of residents. Efforts are underway to conduct a comprehensive impact assessment and increase outreach.

Bogotá’s pioneering initiative highlights the cultural evolution around care. This model is proving to be a catalyst for positive change in the lives of caregivers throughout the city and a reference for other cities to follow.

“Here we can continue studying and fulfill our dreams. We [caretakers] are always told: ‘This is going to inhibit you and you will not be able to move forward,’ but this program really helps us a lot.”

Tatiana Guayara, San Cristóbal Care Block beneficiary (quote provided by the City)
Image Courtesy of the City of Bogotá.

“With this Certification it is evident that Bogotá has put data, technology and innovation at the center of government decisions on critical issues such as the District Care System, the environment and mobility. Our commitment is to continue with this effort, build on what has been built and continue promoting a conscious, responsible and strategic use of information to improve the quality of life of citizens.”

Carlos Fernando Galán Pachón, Mayor

550 caretakers have earned their high school diploma through Care Blocks

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Recife, Brazil

Community Needs Lead in Recife

Project Type:
Education, Health and Wellbeing, High-Performing Government, Public Safety, Technology, Youth Development

At a Glance

15% drop in violence in neighborhoods covered by COMPAZ, more significant when compared to levels of violence throughout the City.

E.I.T.A! Recife, a City-run innovation lab, elevates and experiments with resident solutions to City challenges. More than 660,000 have tested these solutions.

Through an initiative to enable experimentation with digital solutions, the City reduced the time by 70% necessary to implement new solutions.

Development of a vaccination app for COVID-19 that registered 1.6 million users and allowed residents to receive vaccines in an orderly and safe manner, especially compared to vaccine uptake in Brazil overall.

It received resources for climate adaptation via a credit operation with the IDB, which will allow Recife to invest US$364 million in a social, territorial and climate justice initiative called ProMorar. It will be the largest urban resilience program in Brazil and guarantees decent housing for more than 150,000 people.

With an air of historic architecture and an incubator for startups and innovative research, Recife, Brazil, stands out for connecting tradition, modernity and technological expertise. However, Recife has historically had one of the highest levels of income inequality in the country, one of the main factors contributing to conditions that have led to high crime rates in the city. Ranked as the 22nd most dangerous city in the world, Recife recorded 55 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants in 2017.

To combat this violence, as well as drug trafficking, the City drew inspiration from other cities, even traveling to Medellín, Colombia (which successfully implemented a similar project) more than 40 times, to formulate and launch an innovative community center project, COMPAZ. COMPAZ offers a wide range of quality programs and services, from math classes to martial arts classes, to support crime and violence prevention efforts.

With COMPAZ, the city leverages neighborhood-level data and evidence to find and implement solutions by and for communities. Thus, Recife equitably and efficiently supports needy neighborhoods, addressing issues such as public safety and economic mobility with localized and targeted interventions.

“This helps us legitimize the vision that Recife has…when we make data-driven decisions, it leads us to the right solution. We have scarce resources, we need to prioritize allocation and maximize impacts. How can I reach more people with fewer resources?”

João Henrique Campos, Mayor
Image courtesy of the City of Recife.

Data-driven decision making is an integral part of COMPAZ. Using Recife’s open data portal, the city’s evaluation policy unit collaborates with academic institutions to collect data and evaluate program effectiveness, enabling the development of evidence-based policies and programs that provide solutions to issues revealed by the data. The results speak for themselves, with a 15% drop in violence in a COMPAZ neighborhood within four years of starting the project — a significant improvement over the city level, which remained stagnant during that same period.

Recife is not only implementing evidence-based programs like COMPAZ, but it is also at the forefront of innovation. That includes urban space in the city in a testing environment for innovations, making Recife the largest urban open innovation laboratory in Latin America, with an area of 218km². Open Innovation Cycles allow solutions developed by startups to be accelerated by the City Hall through a special contractual regime.Open Innovation Cycles recognize that there are challenges that the public sector cannot achieve alone – transformative solutions must be built with the end user, the resident. The ultimate goal is a city with more equal opportunities for everyone. So far, these innovation cycles have developed:

  • (I) algorithm for completing the electronic medical record integrated into public health systems;
  • (II) software for managing queues for free public health consultations and medical examinations; It is
  • (III) Internet of Things (IoT) sensing for flooding and rain in regions susceptible to disasters to generate real-time alerts and create operational protocols.

The population is at the center of innovative data-driven solutions in Recife. This approach allowed us to tailor policies and programs to the specific needs of the community, using data to determine where resources are most needed and identify opportunities for success.

“We are not reinventing the wheel, we are eager to learn from other cities, from other teams. What works for other cities, we try to adapt to ours.”

João Henrique Campos, Mayor
Image courtesy of the City of Recife.

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Carlsbad, California, USA

Data and a Cross-Sector Approach Lead to Street Safety in Carlsbad.

Project Type:
Community Engagement, Finance, Health and Wellbeing, Infrastructure, Public Safety, Transportation

2024 Gold Certification

Carlsbad, California, achieved a 73 percent decrease in homelessness among veterans by leveraging data in new ways. A key to success was maintaining real-time personalized data on veterans experiencing homelessness, and using that information to catalyze collaboration among service providers to get veterans into permanent housing. The City also adopted its first “data service standard” aimed at making sure that new data products are designed to be as useful as possible for city leaders, residents, and others who may benefit.

2023 Silver Certification

Using road collision heatmaps and other data to inform interventions, the City saw a 19% decrease in all injury collisions.

Monitored progress and changed course when needed to achieve traffic goals using Performance & Analytics strategies.

City’s staff telecommuting policy reduced employee commute time by 47,000 hours and saved the City between $300,000 – $400,000. It has also improved traffic conditions for all city residents and eliminated 424 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions.

Budget and finance processes require data and alignment with the city’s 5-Year Strategic Plan, to ensure funds are efficiently and effectively allocated to address the most important priorities of the community.

The number of collisions involving bikes and e-bikes was already surging in Carlsbad when, in August 2022, two bikers were killed during a 10-day period. The City had issued an ordinance on e-bike safety a few months before, but the tragedies and an alarming 233% increase in collisions involving bike and e-bikes between 2019 and 2022 promoted greater action. City Manager Scott Chadwick declared a 6-month local emergency, which was ratified by the City Council at its next meeting. The emergency allowed the City flexibility to move quickly and focus resources on encouraging everyone to be safer on the road.

Some residents worried that the emergency declaration would lead to less access for bikes or more traffic. But Chadwick was able to reassure them. “We’re going to let the data guide us,” he said. And that is exactly what they did.

Immediately after declaring the emergency, the City began gathering and analyzing additional data on collisions. They created heatmaps to identify the most dangerous intersections, did a 5-year trend analysis, and set up tracking for the future. Armed with data and streamlined procurement processes as part of the emergency declaration, the City was painting key intersections and bike lanes with high-visibility green paint within two weeks. In fact, they moved so fast that they exhausted the supply of green paint in the region.

Within 30 days of the emergency declaration, the City had a full plan in place for improving street safety. The Safer Streets Together Plan seeks to change public behaviors and attitudes by focusing on education, engineering and enforcement. “It wasn’t just, ‘Here’s an emergency.’ The public saw real things happening in the first weeks and months and that’s how this has changed things so quickly,” Chief Innovation Officer David Graham said.

Six months after declaring an emergency, injury collisions across all transportation modes were down by 19% compared to the same time period in the previous year, and injury collisions related to bikes and e-bikes had decreased 13%. Graham points to qualitative measures of success as well – street safety yard signs and car window clings on display throughout the community, residents saying they are wearing helmets and slowing down, and the city’s partnerships with schools and bike organizations.

Because of the positive trends and evidence of behavior change, in March 2023 the City Council voted to extend the emergency declaration for a few more months. City staff hope that a year’s worth of data and analysis will help build a sustainable approach to traffic safety and that the early positive trends will become permanent.

The traffic safety emergency is not the first emergency that Carlsbad has tackled with data-driven decision making. It took a similar and equally successful approach during COVID. Hopefully the City won’t have cause for testing its emergency response again anytime soon, but having a well-honed system for collecting and analyzing data, and for innovating and tracking outcomes means that no matter what the future holds, Carlsbad will be well prepared to handle it.

“To see transformation in government you have to invest in areas that aren’t readily apparent like data and analytics, process improvement and operational excellence. When we work together with our community to discover shared insights around issues like traffic safety, we can create impactful change.”

David Graham, Chief Innovation Officer

“It’s not easy to change the way people behave on the road. Often, you’re trying to change habits people have had for years or decades, for better or worse. By taking a balanced approach to traffic safety and digging into the data, we can see what’s working and what isn’t working, and learn how to be more effective as we move forward.”

Scott Chadwick, City Manager

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Montevideo, Uruguay

Proving That Smooth Data Practices Translate to Smooth Traffic

Project Type:
Community Engagement, Infrastructure, Public Safety, Transportation

2024 Gold Certification

Montevideo, Uruguay marshaled data to keep residents safe during a recent drought and water crisis. As salinity levels in tap water spiked, city leaders publicly shared water-test data daily, enabling pregnant women, people with hypertension, and others to know when water was safe to drink. They also used data to identify vulnerable populations who would benefit most from fresh water deliveries. This work built on a major push to build a culture of data-driven decision making in City Hall; staff were offered a financial incentive for scaling data and evidence practices which moved the city to Gold Certification.

2023 Silver Certification

10 transit intervention plans created for hotspot traffic areas.

Reduced annual traffic fatality rate to 6.2 per 100,000 residents—half the country’s overall rate.

Used strong Data Management practices to develop impactful traffic interventions with real-time data.

In recent decades, the leaders of Montevideo, Uruguay, have become familiar with a simple fact with far-reaching consequences: more people means more vehicles. As Uruguay’s commercial, political and cultural hub, Montevideo is no stranger to traffic. In 2015, its leaders set out to address the City’s massive traffic problem in a data-driven way. The City installed dozens of real-time sensors along major routes, created a new Center for Mobility Management to monitor and manage traffic data collection, and implemented a new mobility plan to cool off hotspots.

After building a data visualization platform that displays real-time traffic levels across Montevideo’s road network, and holding neighborhood meetings to understand residents’ traffic concerns, the City focused transit interventions on 10 particularly congested hot zones. Leaning heavily on sensor data analyses, they simulated the impact of different traffic engineering solutions—such as changing the timing and duration of traffic signals, or making a street one-way—and then settled on the most impactful options for each site. This access to high-quality, real-time data, combined with strong data governance practices, allowed the City to better understand the problem and then to develop and test tailored solutions for the hotspot zones.

“We don’t want to collect information just to verify the reality, we want to collect information to change the reality.”

Carolina Cosse, Mayoress

In addition to real quality-of-life improvements for Montevideo drivers, the City also realized environmental benefits, including reduced CO2 emissions, due to less idling, and better fuel economy. Moreover, the City’s commitment to improving traffic flow is helping to save lives. Montevideo’s annual traffic fatality rate is now 6.2 per 100,000 residents—half the country’s overall rate. City leaders believe that the installation of speed radars across the City, along with efforts to lower congestion in hotspots, has helped change driver behavior and prevent traffic-related deaths.

When you can measure a problem, you can manage it—and that’s exactly what Montevideo officials are doing, street by street.

“For us, What Works Cities Certification is a way to measure our performance. The goal isn’t to be happy with where we are now—although we’re proud of our progress—but rather to evolve and provide better services to residents.”

Carolina Cosse, Mayoress

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Mogi das Cruzes, Brazil

Where Urban Planning is for the Children of Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.

Project Type:
Community Engagement, Health and Wellbeing, Infrastructure, Parks and Recreation, Youth Development

2024 Gold Certification

Mogi das Cruzes, Brazil, is boosting transparency and open data. Since becoming one of the first cities in Latin America to achieve Certification in 2023, Mogi das Cruzes has worked hard to become a more transparent government. The City launched its first Open Government Action Plan, which includes 12 steps to improve information accessibility. They also introduced a comprehensive Transparency Portal, which features open data, public works updates, and up-to-date budget information. Finally, the City offers free online training for both government employees and residents on open government principles. These efforts go beyond policies on paper, they actively build trust with residents, promote accountability and encourage community engagement.

2023 Silver Certification

Created Participa Mogi – an online platform for citizen participation. In its first year, the City received over 1,300 public contributions.

When employment data showed that 25% of Mogi workers were commuting outside of the City, Mogi added 7,000 new jobs in 2022 and increased revenue by 33% ($700 million BRL).

To combat hunger, Mogi das Cruzes created the Social Market Program, which connects farmers to over 1,200 families in vulnerable situations to receive free food.

Deployed innovative Qualitative Data Practices to better understand residents’ needs.

Mogi das Cruzes has found a winning combination. The City of more than 470,000 in São Paulo State is setting itself up for success by using data and community engagement as the foundation of its strategic plan.

Part of this plan includes giving the mic to Mogi’s youngest residents. Mogi das Cruzes wants to be a child-centered city. City officials are asking children for ideas for improving their neighborhoods so that the next generation engages with their government and community. In December 2022, Mogi announced its first “Our Neighborhood Detectives.” Between the ages of 9 and 12, these 24 children will participate in discussions and make suggestions about how to improve the quality of life and urban landscape for all children and adults living in Mogi.

“These boys and girls will represent the children in their neighborhoods and help us create a better city. Their input is an important complement to our data that will improve our decision-making and inspire civic engagement in young people.”

Caio Cunha, Mayor
Image Courtesy of Warley Kenji.

The Neighborhood Detectives project is part of the Mogi Cidade da Criança (City of Children) program, which uses an innovative community engagement and design approach to inform the City’s investments in the wellbeing of its children. Another project within Mogi Cidade da Criança is monitoring air quality for its impact on children’s health. The air quality data is used to make decisions and create action plans, such as enhancing green spaces and encouraging active mobility to reduce emissions.

In addition to engaging its children in planning, the City seeks feedback from residents through regional meetings and neighborhood visits. By thoughtfully and rigorously soliciting resident input, the City is able to use this qualitative data to deepen community impact and better serve residents’ needs. For instance, the City asked for resident feedback about public transportation by conducting surveys in-person on the bus. Bus users were interviewed and the resulting data was used to optimize bus routes.

Mogi das Cruzes also created the Participia Mogi platform for residents to provide input on planning and budget priorities online. The City is opening its internal data up to residents as well, by hosting Open Data Days and making geospatial data available on the GeoMogi website.

“Staff perceive the need to use data in their day-to-day and Certification is helping with this culture shift. Once you have this cultural shift, you can’t go back.”

Caio Cunha, Mayor
Image Courtesy of Warley Kenji.

Additionally, under the guidance of Mayor Cunha, the formula of data and resident input is being used to create a long-term, 40-year plan for the City. The ultimate success of the plan requires institutionalizing recent progress on collecting, managing and analyzing the City’s data. The Mayor’s hope is that residents will expect future administrations to continue the shared vision within a long-term plan: “We wanted this to be a plan for everyone, so we are building a sustainable program that represents the needs of the City as a whole, for today and for the next generation of Mogi residents.”

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Fortaleza, Brazil

Data-Driven Approach Cuts Traffic Deaths by 57%.

Project Type:
Community Engagement, Infrastructure, Public Safety, Transportation

At a Glance

Reduced traffic fatalities by 57% over 10 years (2012-22)

1,086 lives saved

Eight consecutive years of fatality reductions

Mayor José Sarto signed a commitment to reduce fatalities by another 50% in the next 10 years

Monitored progress and changed course when needed to achieve traffic goals using Performance & Analytics strategies

At a recent public hearing on traffic accidents in Fortaleza, everyone participating shared that they knew someone who had lost their life or was critically injured in an accident. With 5 million daily trips and 29% of motorists on motorcycles, traffic fatalities have been an unfortunate part of life for Fortaleza’s 2.6 million residents.

In 2012, Fortaleza took action. Starting with historic traffic data, the City set goals and made evidence-based decisions about speed limits and traffic patterns. In 2021, it launched the Vida platform to consolidate traffic data from varying institutions and make it publicly accessible.

With these performance management and data-driven approaches, the City reduced traffic fatalities by 57% over 10 years. Additionally, the City established a road safety committee that meets every 15 days to review crash data and predictive analysis, using it to adjust strategies. The first city in Brazil to have a municipal road safety plan as law, Fortaleza has saved 1,086 lives and saved the City close to $42 million Brazilian Reals ($8.3 million USD).

“All of our actions, everything we do, is based on data and evidence.”

Elcio Batista, Vice Mayor

Still, Mayor Sarto is acutely aware that the City saw 158 traffic deaths in 2022, and he is committed to reducing fatalities by another 50% by 2031.

Fortaleza’s aim to realize Vision Zero—an international program working to eliminate all traffic fatalities and severe injuries—is just one of the data initiatives that has helped the City achieve What Works Cities Gold Certification. With its focus on data, the City has reduced school dropout rates, digitized its construction permitting process and launched an app to track sexual harassment on public transit. Fortaleza has also made progress on building a data culture: They developed a clear governance structure to coordinate data use, launched an Open Data Plan to guide data oversight, and concentrated over 200 datasets from 28 organizations in an Open Data Portal. By making so much City data publicly available, the City is promoting informed decision-making, transparency and robust resident engagement.

Vice Mayor Elcio Batista sees even more progress on the horizon. “Being Certified makes me proud and hopeful. Proud of what we have accomplished and hopeful for what is still to come.”

“By achieving Certification, it shows we are trying to do things the right way. It’s an honor for us, for the team, and it gives us a passport for the future.”

Jose Sarto, Mayor

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Buenos Aires,
Argentina

Public Policies Based on Data Lead to Significant Decrease in Infant Mortality

Project Type:
Health and Wellbeing, High-Performing Government, Youth Development

At a Glance

39% decline in the infant mortality rate between 2016 and 2022.

15 minutes: the maximum time it takes for a resident to reach a community healthcare center.

300 individual metrics are being tracked to support the quality and reliability of 115 public services.

100% of Buenos Aires community health centers now operate with electronic medical charts.

The City now has a thorough data strategy, clear evidence-based policies, 30 executive dashboards, and more than 4,300 indicators after creating the Undersecretariat for Evidence-Based Public Policies and the General Directorate of Monitoring and Evaluation.

Reducing the Infant Mortality Rate

Improving the infant mortality rate in Buenos Aires, which was 7.2 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2016, required a multi-pronged strategy, especially because the hospitals and doctors offices are run by public and private entities as well as social security. Additionally, the strategy was not just medical—it required the coordinated approach of the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Human Development and Habitat to carry out policies that considered both medical and social implications.

Effective solutions to complex and urgent problems require more than passion and good ideas. City leaders need the right data to illuminate the depth and breadth of an issue; that is what sets the stage for smart public policy.

Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, Mayor

The City, which had already worked to build a data-driven culture, took another step forward by implementing electronic medical records in all health and community action centers (CeSACs), collecting healthcare data from across Buenos Aires to better identify at-risk pregnant women and develop integrated interventions to both strengthen health services and create targeted solutions. Specific goals were established:

  • Make healthcare more accessible so that every resident has a community healthcare center less than 15 minutes from their home.
  • All women would receive at least five checkups over the course of a pregnancy and seven pediatric consultations during the baby’s first year.
  • Promote the healthy development of vulnerable children between 45 days and 3 years old through 76 early childhood centers.

With these clear, measurable targets and the increase in higher quality data, all of the goals had been reached by 2022. Additionally, the City reached their goals with an emphasis on transparency: Buenos Aires’ General Directorate of Statistics and Censuses allowed residents to have transparent and reliable access to data as well as a way to monitor and evaluate progress on the measures the City was taking to improve healthcare.

How else has Buenos Aires become a more data-driven government? 

  • Digitized and streamlined their procurement system and made data on city contracts open and accessible.
  • BOTI, the first city-developed chatbot for WhatsApp in the world, had 59 million conversations with residents in 2022. 
  • Developed “green streets” to create more natural space for pedestrian enjoyment and capture stormwater.
  • Created a 3D model of the City to aid neighborhood development and make it easier to see regulations and codes. 

The Ministry of Health constructed seven new health care centers and renovated 10 others. Pregnant women were given priority when making appointments online for primary care visits. Targeted campaigns involving workshops, at-work training and seminars—on subjects including sleeping and eating habits—had reached 7,000 families considered to be highly vulnerable. And the overall impact was clear: The City of Buenos Aires reduced its infant mortality rate by 39% from 7.2 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2016, to 4.4 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2022. 

Buenos Aires’ progress on maternal care and infant health is just one example of how the City’s commitment to improve data quality, quantity and practices is bearing fruit. But a 39% decrease in infant mortality rate is more than a success story for the City of Buenos Aires—it’s a number that represents the prevention of heartbreaking losses in scores of families—and incalculable joy as families watch their children grow up.  

“We have a limited time to transform reality—and data-driven governance can accelerate positive change. By having shared standards and rules for data management, we create a common understanding and language, powering day-to-day change.”

Melisa Breda, Undersecretary of Evidence-Based Public Policy

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