3/1/2024 0 Comments Open checkbookI decided to start with a small sample size of ten Services to manually run search queries using Google, of which I was able to find 10 addresses for each service, to varying degrees of difficulty. I first decided to choose a column to use as my search query, and the one I chose was “Service” column. With this data in a much easier to work with format, my first goal was to manually see how I would be able to find an address using the present data. (For simplicity, this Excel Workbook will be referred to as The Database or OCB Database) As such, I was able to download and work directly within the source data which was a Microsoft Excel Workbook. The OCB data while on a dashboard made via Power BI, wasn’t much help to me, especially with me adding new data it. I started with my main method of data collection, which involved web searching. In order to go about creating such a system and answering this question, I first had to understand what type of processes would be involved. I also set out to answer the key data science question of “Is it possible to extract/ generate location data from a pre-existing database?” This was an ambitious project from the onset, but I was ready to take on such a challenge as the findings from this project held great implications for future data science projects. With that key metric not present, it was my goal to come up with a system that would generate that location data based upon the data already provided by the Mayor’s Office. The main thing is that while this system may break down the City’s spending, it doesn’t do a great to inform users where this money is spent. This data is usually a searchable address, a neighborhood, or zip code, even a set of longitudinal and latitudinal coordinates. To be more specific, the type of data that was missing from this dashboard was location information. While this level of transparency is great as it allows citizens and taxpayers alike to see exactly what the money is going towards within the city, the biggest problem that I noticed is that it didn’t exactly show where the money is going. This is not a new concept as various other cities have had their own Open Checkbook programs and dashboards New York City has the most renowned version of this system dating back to 2010. This service specifically was introduced by Mayor Brandon Scott thus, it is a service created and managed by the Mayor’s Office. (For the sake of simplicity will be referred to as OCB.) Currently, the city has made two fiscal years’ worth of data publicly available through Open Checkbook Baltimore. This dashboard has a plethora of interactable graphs, charts, filters, and other features that allow users to narrow down and find specific spending metrics of Baltimore City. Open Checkbook Baltimore is a dashboard created using Microsoft Power BI, which is a visual data representation tool. The City of Baltimore has a system called “Open Checkbook Baltimore” wherein they publicly publish the various transactions that the city has made over the course of a fiscal year (a fiscal year defined by the city as beginning July 1 st, ending June 30 th).
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