Phil Bertolini is the CIO and Deputy County Executive for Oakland County, Michigan. Bertolini is a vocal advocate for enterprise solutions in government, cross-boundary resource sharing, and inter...
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The best ideas come from the American people. Everyone has a story to tell, everyone has a part to play.
All across the country, ordinary Americans are doing extraordinary things in their communities to out-innovate, out-educate, and out-build the rest of the world. Every week, we will invite these Champions of Change to the White House to share their ideas to win the future.
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Champions of Change: Local Innovation
The White House honors 13 Local Innovation Champions of Change who have committed themselves to creating a more open and innovative government through entrepreneurship.
Mary Bunting is City Manager of Hampton, VA, where she has served in various capacities for 22 years. The power of community was demonstrated to her when local scholarships helped Mary achieve an...
As the City’s first Chief Innovation Officer (CIO), Adel Ebeid, is responsible for leading the City’s IT innovation strategy to advance the City’s digital quality of life. A passion for using...
Michael P. Flowers is the Analytics Director for New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s Office of Policy and Strategic Planning. Mr. Flowers leads a team of data scientists in analyzing city...
Carolyn T. Hogg has served as the Chief Information Officer for the City of Fresno for the past five years. Recognizing that a city is only as good as the region surrounding it, led her to partner...
Michele Hovet is currently a Deputy City Manager for the City of Arvada, Colorado. She also was the Chief Information Officer for Arvada for over 17 years. She is a board member for OpenColorado....
Doug Matthews has spent the last 18 years working to improve local government's connections with their communities. A graduate of the University of Central Florida (BA, Journalism) and the...
Jay Nath is the Chief Innovation Officer for Mayor Ed Lee in the City of San Francisco. In this role, Nath is working with the technology community and the public to help reinvent government in...
John Tolva is the City of Chicago’s first Chief Technology Officer, working for Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Tolva has overseen Mayor Emanuel's implementation of policy for open, participatory government for...
Dr. Ted Smith is the Chief of Economic Growth & Innovation for Metro Louisville Government. Ted works to make local government a platform for innovation and entrepreneurship through open data...
Rob White is the Director of Economic Development for the City of Livermore and the Interim CEO of the i-GATE Innovation Hub, a broad super-regional partnership that is focused on Lawrence...
Nigel Jacob is the Co-Chair for the Mayor’s Office of New Urban Mechanics in Boston, Massachusetts. Mayor Thomas M. Menino founded the Mayor’s Office of New Urban Mechanics in 2010 as Boston’s...
Chris Osgood is the Co-Chair for the Mayor’s Office of New Urban Mechanics in Boston, Massachusetts. Mayor Thomas M. Menino founded the Mayor’s Office of New Urban Mechanics in 2010 as Boston’s...
Champions Blog Posts
- September 27, 2012 at 4:48 PM EDT
Connecting Communities
Michele Hovet is the Deputy City Manager for the City of Arvada, Colorado. Michele believes that with technology and innovative public servants, anything is possible. She sees technology as a catalyst for innovation, and strives to connect her community through OpenColorado, a community asset she helped found for all local government data in Colorado.
- September 27, 2012 at 4:04 PM EDT
Entrepreneurial Local Governments -- A Catalyst for Collaboration and Innovation
Rob White is the Director of Economic Development for the City of Livermore and the Interim CEO of the i-GATE Innovation Hub, a broad super-regional partnership that is focused on Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories/CA as economic engines. In his role as Economic Developer, Rob works across sectors and regions to translate the entrepreneurial ecosystem present in Silicon Valley into a living network of government advocacy, research collaboration, and industry investment.
- September 27, 2012 at 3:48 PM EDT
Government as a Connector
Doug Matthews is the Chief Communications Director of Austin, Texas, working to define "government as a connector." In the past two years, Doug has helped launch one of the largest municipal open source websites in the nation, including a portal for open data, and a partnership with Code for America.
- September 27, 2012 at 3:41 PM EDT
Ensuring Local Budget Choices Are Understood
Mary Bunting is the City Manager of Hampton, Virginia, working to make her city's budget a much less intimidating issue and more participatory process. With help from a lot of people, Mary decided to engage residents with the budget by using an aggressive outreach program of large public gatherings—including adding instant polling technology that allowed every person to voice an opinion on every issue and immediately see the group polling result.
