Press Coverage

New York City's crime map can tell you where a burglary or assault occurred, but a bill being introduced today would make the city plot traffic tickets and summonses as well, the legislation's author, Councilmen Ben Kallos told amNY.

Kallos' bill requires noncriminal violations to be posted on the city's crime map along with dates, times and location information down to the longitude and latitude coordinates, if possible.

He said this level of detail would bolster the city's Vision Zero pedestrian safety effort by providing more exact locations of incidents and traffic violations.

Under legislation to be introduced by Councilman Ben Kallos (D-Manhattan), the city would be required to post all government notices on its website — from announcements of a community board meeting to an application for a new sidewalk cafe.

“There’s literally hundreds and hundreds of places where the government has to make a public notice — but nobody knows what the government is doing, because the public notice requirements are so arcane,” said Kallos, chairman of the government operations committee.

In a letter to City Hall, officials who oppose the 91st St. Marine Transfer station ask Mayor de Blasio to investigate the hikes in a probe similar to the one he announced of the new 911 system. That project was $1 billion over budget and six years over due.

“Responsible budgeting would require oversight and review,” said the letter from six elected officials, including City Councilman Ben Kallos, state Sen. Liz Krueger and Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney.

Now, a City Council member, Ben Kallos (D-Upper East Side), has introduced a resolution calling on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to sign into law bill A-8198, the Democratic Assembly bill, and for the Senate to pass and the governor to sign S-6204, the corresponding state Senate bill.

The New York City Council on Wednesday unanimously passed a resolution amending its rules to require the Council Speaker to make available legislative tracking information data and discretionary funding data to the public in a machine-readable format, and City Council members and open government advocates see the changes as a basis for making legislative information available through an open API. The resolution also calls on the Council Speaker to develop a periodically updated public technology plan on improving public access to Council material and meetings.

"I am working to ensure that civic hackers like those at the Sunlight Foundation can build an open API with bulk downloads so the transparency the rules and people demand becomes a reality in the coming months," City Council member Ben Kallos, chair of the Government Operations Committee, said in a statement e-mailed to techPresident. 

They have signed on to a resolution from Manhattan Councilman Ben Kallos, which would recommend greater disclosure on application forms filed by candidates and independent screening panels to be set up by each borough.