living
BUZZ
Southern Alberta news highlights
City of Lethbridge
launches Open Data Catalogue
AS PART OF THE City
of Lethbridge’s Intelligent
Community initiative, an
Open Data Catalogue is now
available for the public.
Unlike other municipal
data that has been available
previously, open data is structured, machine-readable, easy
to access, simple to reuse, and is made freely available
for anyone to use and republish without restrictions. For
example, mobile phone apps can be built using the data,
websites can use the data in new ways, and users can conduct
custom data analysis.
“The launch of this Open Data Catalogue is a significant early
milestone for our overall Intelligent Community initiative,”
says Doug Hawkins, Director of Infrastructure Services for the
City of Lethbridge. “We’re making excellent progress.”
Data sets available in this initial release include information
on city facilities, election and census results, parks and
recreation facilities, transportation, land use, and transit. The
selection of available data sets will expand over time.
“I’m excited to see the innovative ways that people will
use this data to create benefits for citizens, businesses, and
visitors,” says Kyle Davey, Business Technology Manager for
the City. “There are endless possibilities in the ways users
can apply this data. They’re going to do things with this
information that we can’t even imagine.”
All data is thoroughly vetted to ensure no private citizen
information is published. Protecting the privacy of Lethbridge
citizens is critical and will continue to be a top priority as
future data sets are published. The Open Data Catalogue is
open to the public for viewing at: opendata.lethbridge.ca.
Chinook Regional Foundation for Career
Transitions awarded substantial grant
to help youth succeed
THE COMMUNITY FOUNDATIONS OF CANADA is
granting $170,000 over the
next two years to the Chinook
Regional Foundation for
Career Transitions to fund
their
newest
program,
Project SPARC Southwest.
SPARC stands for Students Participating Actively
in Realizing Connections. The new project will help
approximately 300 youth from six school divisions
throughout Southwest Alberta, and will be regional in
scope, with schools referring students with highest priority
of need to Career Transitions. This includes students who
are still enrolled in school, but not actively attending or
engaged in classes.
The SPARC program will allow Career Transitions to meet
with students who need it most to discuss their options
for the future. The program will be delivered out of sites
such a