Cause Project
by BENEFICENT TECHNOLOGY INC
$500,000.00
Donation Goal
Donation Goal
Project Details
The Need:
For thousands of low-income individuals, daily survival depends on timely access to numerous safety net services (shelters, food pantries, health care; counseling). This safety net is unfortunately difficult to navigate, access and fund. Which agencies provide which services to whom? Where an how can people access them? These details are always in flux and new referral services and directories keep proliferating. The resulting landscape of information is redundant, fragmented, unsustainable and inaccessible for analysis, draining resources that could instead be used to help Californians.
A New Approach:
ServiceNet: A coordinated network of information systems openly sharing resource data in real time. This project will make it easier to share and maintain information about the local social services available to people in need. We will pilot an "open data exchange infrastructure" in the SF Bay Area that enables resource data to be cooperatively maintained and freely accessible by a diverse collection of referral systems. (Call centers; paper directories; resource websites and apps)
At the core of the Ser model is a standardized data exchange format (developed in collaboration with Code for America and Google.org).
"Interoperability" is the foundation of a healthy information ecosystem in which records can be updated once and accessed simultaneously by many systems.
Project Milestones:
* Prototype and scale open data infrastructure that integrates with third-party systems
* Facilitate development of tools that leverage this infrastructure to help people find help.
* Develop an organizational partnership model that will sustain cooperation over time.
Leadership and Partners and Allies
Benetech: Dr. Anh Bui
Open Referral.org: Greg Bloom
United Way of Bay Area
California Health and Human Services Agency;
iCarol
Link-SF.com
SF Homeless Wiki
Funding Opportunities:
Phase 1: (6-month Pilot) Cost: $50K-$70K
- initial convening of partners; analysis of tens of thousands of data records; scoping; light prototyping.
Phase 2: (18-month scale-up) Cost: $600K - $700K
- convenings and community engagement
- iterative development of prototypes
- testing with local partners
- deployment of solutions
- evaluation of results
- plan for sustainability/governance
Donation Deadline
Deadline Not Specified
Project Website
http://www.benetech.org Project Location
480 S California Ave Ste 201, PALO ALTO,
California 94306-1609
United States.