The harsh light of the Covid-19 pandemic has illuminated a lot of things that we weren’t seeing so clearly before: who government aid reaches and who it leaves out, and the gaps embedded in the policy making process. The harsh light of the Covid-19 pandemic has illuminated a lot of things that we weren’t seeing
While the rest of the world has evolved to a place where we can track anything at all times and order anything from anywhere, government is hopelessly stranded on an island in 1993. We take a look at what happened and why. (excerpted from Why Government Websites Fail) During a crisis, a lot more of
IRS data doesn’t tell us much about who is being helped by stimulus payments. Here’s what the data we really need would look like. When Congress passed the CARES Act in March, Americans readied to receive $2 trillion in stimulus money. But policy doesn’t happen without thinking through delivery. And on the delivery side of
With the virus overwhelming many governments, technologists have jumped into action to build open source tools the public needs now. A new repository collects them in one place. From its start, the COVID-19 pandemic has been in large part a crisis of information. As schools and businesses closed and stay-at-home orders spread across the country,
A Q&A with Mark Lerner, who spearheaded the creation of New America’s new Pandemic Response Repository Earlier this month, after a frenzied few weeks of work, New America unveiled its Pandemic Response Repository. Mark Lerner, a New America fellow who works with the organization’s Public Interest Technology program and Digital Governance and Impact Initiative (DIGI),
Members of The Commons, If your inbox is anything like ours it is overflowing with other people’s ideas and inventions aimed at tracking and slowing the spread of COVID-19. (Interspersed with emails from seemingly every company you have interacted with online, ever.) In this second weekly edition of The Commons we’ve sifted through the noise
Members of The Commons, The pandemic has dramatically changed our lives in little more than a week. Uncertainty reigns as we all grapple with new public health restrictions and new ways of being together while apart. We at The Commons have been heartened to see the civic tech and gov tech communities spring into action,
Vicki Shabo is a Senior Fellow for Paid Leave Policy and Strategy in New America’s Better Life Lab. How to design easy-to-use and accessible programs that support working parents, caregivers and patients. Imagine you’ve spent the evening holding your father’s hand in the hospital after he came out of surgery. You live in one of
The state’s Children’s Services Agency is overhauling its outdated software system, Jeremy Gantz reports—and the effort promises to free up valuable staff time, allowing employees to spend more time in the field. When JooYeun Chang decided to move to Michigan last year to take the helm of the state’s Children’s Services Agency, she had a
Meegan Dugan Bassett, Fellow, New America Chicago A brilliant policy isn’t worth much if people can’t figure out how to benefit from it. We need to see delivery as a core part of policymaking. I’ve been just as guilty of it as anyone else working in the public policy world. A bunch of people with