Open Data meets DevolutionThe Open County Initiative case.

BACKGROUND

Kenya among the most recent countries to effect devolution (2010)

Spirit behind devolution Ensure equitable sharing of resources

Better service delivery Promote participation of citizens in governance

More robust citizen engagement Bring government closer to the people

More accountable government

The Open County Initiative

Established by the Open Institute

Aims to support devolution by: Promoting development of Open Government

policies in sub-national governments (entrenching FOI)

Build tools to support National and County governments using Open Data

Build Appetite for Data and capacity for use among CSOs, Government, media and citizen groups

Some of the activities of OCI (2014)

Helped organise the first devolution conference with Council of Governors

Supported development of Council of Governors website and structuring of County Government Data

Built capacity of Governors and senior government officials to appreciate data in government

Trained devolution CSOs on data literacy and visualisation

Organised roundtables for County governments with CSOs

Stakeholders

• Governor• Department Secretaries• Management Level (ICT,

Treasury, Communications)

• Community media• Open Government working

group• Devolution working group

• Transitional Authority

• COG• COB• CIC• CRA

• Ministry of Devolution & Planning

• Treasury• Auditor General• ICT

National government

Independent Constitutional

bodies

47 County GovernmentsCSOs & Media

The challenge of data

Devolution came into effect March 2013 Focus on transferring functions (and budgets and

control) from National Government to County Governments

Counties have no capacity to collect and manage data

Structure of power and control still major point of discussion

Accountability a major concern for citizens (therefore for governors political considerations)

The Open County Dashboard

http://kenya.opencounty.org

Intended outcomes

Improved accountability by county government To COB as required by law To citizens

Increase reporting automation Therefore reduce time and cost involved in reporting

process

Improved quality and usability of Open Data For public service use For public consumption

Dashboard

Budgets

Allocated budget

Release information

Allocation (dept)

Projects

Dashboard (continued)

Success

1st County Dashboard

2013 Data liberated for 16 counties (early adopters)

Capacity development at county level 12 county governments Data LitCamps

At least 8 can upload data directly Data LitCamps CSOs & Community media at least 12

counties

2014 data not approved for publication

Clear appetite for data among community CSOs

County Government LitCamps

CSO LitCamps

The road ahead for dashboard (Kenya)

Extend the Open County dashboard usage across all 47 counties Develop interfaces for Auditor General

Advocate for dashboard usage as policy

Increase amount of data in the dashboard

Include Contracts data in the tracking

Start trending with 2014 approved data

Replicability: Bauchi State, Nigeria

http://opencounty.org