Long Beach One of First Cities in U.S. to Display Open Data in Geospatial Data Format

Today, the City of Long Beach launched DataLB, the City’s new Open Data Portal. This new portal is designed to implement modern Citywide practices for sharing data with the public, staff, and policy makers as outlined in the Open Data Policy, adopted by the City Council on December 20, 2016.

“Long Beach’s DataLB portal is making the vast amount of City data useful for a wider variety of purposes,” said Mayor Robert Garcia. “Not only will people be able to use DataLB and new apps available online to chart information like crime rates, but businesses can see the best areas to establish themselves and grow. This is a great tool for the City and the community.”

Throughout the world, governments are making the collection of public data more readily available to communities and interested stakeholders. The type of data posted, called Open Data, is diverse and includes information and statistics on a variety of topics, such as where and how taxpayer money is being spent. This openness has enabled residents to have greater insight into the inner workings of their local, state, and federal agencies.

“Providing data online is not a new concept in government,” said Bryan M. Sastokas, Chief Information Officer. “However, the City of Long Beach wants to drive beyond presenting data online and our DataLB portal is an innovative approach that allows the public to operationalize data, making it more useful to the community and building on the City’s commitment to transparency.”

DataLB is the City’s public Geographic & Open Data Portal for exploring, visualizing and downloading data that has been made publicly available. Long Beach is one of the first cities to embrace Open Data in a more interactive, geospatial manner, and this portal allows users to analyze and combine Open Data layers using a map viewer, as well as develop new web and mobile applications.

DataLB was created in partnership with Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI), an international supplier of geographic information system (GIS) software, web GIS and geodatabase management applications. With DataLB, the datasets published by the City will be centralized in one location, at http://datalb.longbeach.gov. The City’s DataLB portal and all public data posted on the portal are subject to the Terms of Use outlined in the City’s Open Data Policy.