5 Reasons to Use American Rescue Funds

Tyler Podcast Episode 25, Transcript

Our Tyler Technologies podcast explores a wide range of complex, timely, and important issues facing communities and the public sector. Expect approachable tech talk mixed with insights from subject matter experts and a bit of fun. Host and Content Marketing Director Jeff Harrell — and other guest hosts — highlights the people, places, and technology making a difference. Give us listen today and subscribe.

 

Episode Summary

With the American Rescue Plan passed, many are looking at the best use of those funds to strengthen government for both short-term and long-term success. Today, we look at how those funds might be used to support data infrastructure, and we turn to an external subject matter expert Tyler Kleykamp.

Tyler is a Fellow at Georgetown University's Beeck Center for Social Impact & Innovation and director of the State Chief Data Officers Network. Tyler was the state of Connecticut's first chief data officer (CDO) and one of the first in the nation. A geographer by training, most of Tyler's career has been in Connecticut state government including positions with the Department of Public Health, Office of Policy and Management, and the Governor's Office.

In his role as CDO, Tyler led Connecticut's efforts to use data to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of state programs, policies, and services. He was named a "Data and IT Innovator" by Route Fifty. In 2019, Tyler was named one of Government Technology's "Top 25 Doers, Dreamers, and Drivers." Tyler brings us his five reasons to use the American Rescue Plan funds to support data infrastructure. 

Transcript:

Jeff Harrell: Well Tyler, thanks so much again for joining us. And I know you're a fellow at The Beeck Center for Social Impact and Innovation at Georgetown University, and I'd love for you to tell us a little bit about the work that you do there.

Tyler Kleykamp: Sure. Thanks for having me. The Beeck center, it really focuses on changing institutions for the betterment of public services. And institutions could mean, anything from governments to financial institutions, or even things like universities. And we focus on three areas which are data, the building the capacities or the workforce, people working in public interest technology, and then really the technological infrastructure around things like, improving the way we might deliver public services or benefits to people. And so, we have a variety of projects going on within the center. My specific areas really focused on working with state chief data officers through the state network and with a heavy emphasis on how states can leverage data to really drive the way they make policy or deliver services.

Tyler Kleykamp: And so really what we're looking to do is, there's a lot of the core data infrastructure and capacity, that states are really just scratching the surface on. And so we support CDOs and their work in establishing some of those foundational pieces. But what's a long-term vision of them applying that work within specific public policy or service delivery areas, especially where states are uniquely positioned, either from a policy-making perspective or maybe it's from the data that they have. And so whether it's improving public education or reducing opioid-related overdose, that's really the area where we want to take data to support states.

Jeff Harrell: I'm interested in that first one you mentioned. The workforce, back when I went to college in the late 80s, early 90s, there weren't a lot of majors, and data, and the positions that you could have in the work force. Are you working with universities to help them come up with curriculum and different majors to help supply that workforce?

Tyler Kleykamp: That's certainly part of it. So right now we're working, so there's a place called the McCourt school of public policy at Georgetown, where we're doing some work with them to introduce public interest technology. I [inaudible] their curriculum or even some of their more senior executive training programs. But then also, even the people that are currently working in the field, the idea of public interest technology, it's a new term I guess. And so there are people who actually are doing this work today, maybe not necessarily even recognizing that they're part of our broader community of public interest technologists. So part of it is even just understanding the landscape of the work, and who's out there doing what.

 

Jeff Harrell: Oh, that's great. Well, I'm excited about our conversation today because we're going to talk about five reasons to use the American rescue plan funds to support data infrastructure. I know this is a topic that you have a lot of passion about, and so excited to hear your five reasons. Let's dive right in. Tyler, what's your first reason for using the American rescue plan funds to support data infrastructure?

Tyler Kleykamp: Well, if we really want to recover in a way that is informed, states especially, but also even local government and the federal government have really a unique opportunity to leverage data to help them better understand the decisions that they might be making from, whether it's a policy perspective or budgeting perspective, to make sure that as we implement different types of programs or interventions that are designed to re-rebuild our economy, we have this untapped resource in states that can drive better decision-making or delivery of programs. And so as an example, when the federal government rolled out the paycheck protection program, that was really a typical implementation of a support program. Which is, here are the broad criteria that have to be met and then go and apply for assistance. Right?

Tyler Kleykamp: And so as we saw through the rollout of that program, there were groups like, I think there was an NBA basketball team who may have received a paycheck protection loan and others. And so maybe the individuals or the small businesses that were in some of the most heavily impacted areas, might've been passed over or didn't quite know where to go to get the assistance. And so if we had really leveraged data to look at, businesses that started laying off employees, or locations of maybe businesses that were closing as a result of the pandemic, we could of really targeted those types of assistance, to neighborhoods or sectors of the economy that were being maybe more disproportionately impacted rather than broadly rolling out these programs.

Why is this a unique opportunity for government?

Tyler Kleykamp: So that's a really unique opportunity at this point because ideally, we start to truly enter this recovery phase here in the next couple of months. And so, especially with now an influx of additional capital into states that are strapped from a budget perspective, they can certainly use this funding to set up not only the technical infrastructure, but even the people infrastructure necessary to leverage data in this way.

Jeff Harrell: I love that, the nuance as you think about recovery. You hear the word recovery a lot, but informed recovery you don't really think about. So making sure that you have the information you need to apply the funds in the right places, that's a really unique look at it. I really liked that. And by the way, for the listeners, I will add these five reasons in the show notes. So if you're following along, I will add that in the show notes for your information as well. So that's great. So it's necessary for informed recovery. What's a second reason?

Tyler Kleykamp: Well, it's vital for an equitable recovery as well. And so again, I think as we've seen throughout the course of the last year, the pandemic has disproportionately impacted communities of color, areas of higher degrees of poverty, certain sectors of the workforce. And so we really have an opportunity now, as we really look to support individuals that are say, on maybe a snap program like the food assistance program. We can leverage data to better connect those individuals with new opportunities, say in the workplace or in the workforce, to really target the efforts to those that have really been disproportionately impacted by this. And it could be things like ensuring that as we lift eviction and foreclosure moratoria, that we are then targeting the communities for things like rental assistance or other types of housing programs in those areas, to make sure that ultimately we hear the term build back better.

Tyler Kleykamp: And that means not returning to the place where we were, where certain parts of our society have been historically overlooked. We now have an opportunity to make sure that everybody gets the fair shot to recover versus an approach that's built on, frankly some historic and structural racism that's existed in our country. And so these are ways that we can support people that have been especially hard hit as a result of where they live, the zip code that they live in, what their job is moving forward.

Tyler Kleykamp: And the key to this is really, we need high-quality data infrastructure. And that's the technology and the people that know how to really pull together and integrate data across these disparate systems, and really analyze it to make sure that not only as we spend money, that it's going to those communities that have been most significantly impacted, but that it's also being done in a way that's elevating these programs in through an equity lens to make sure that it's not just the financial assistance, but the programs and policies that we're putting in place moving forward, are truly lifting people up out of poverty.

Jeff Harrell: This is great Tyler. The first one was informed recovery. The second one was equitable recovery. You hinted at the third one, but what's the third reason to use the funds for?

Tyler Kleykamp: Yeah, absolutely. We need a more modern digital infrastructure in this country, and it's not just the data infrastructure. I think we've seen the overall digital infrastructure really struggle, whether it was the unemployment insurance systems across states or even Medicaid application, snap applications, those programs really struggled under the increased need to access those systems. And so it takes a significant investment to totally overhaul all of those systems, but we can, one, start with the data infrastructure because what we were seeing, at least at the state level, was the difficulty in integrating data across these different systems. So even early on during the pandemic, it was really difficult for states to understand hospital capacity. So states could know maybe how many people were hospitalized, but it was very difficult for them to actually have the denominator there.

Tyler Kleykamp: So they didn't necessarily know what the actual capacity of the hospital is. So, if a hospital reports they have a 100 people in there, they could still have a 100 additional beds available, and states really struggled to do that. So this is an opportunity at a relatively low cost to do so, to put that data infrastructure in place that can help us integrate across these different systems that will then make those, whether it's the benefits systems, so people don't have to enter in their information in 10 different places in order to see what benefits they qualify for. That's the potential that exists here to deliver services better moving forward.

Jeff Harrell: And Tyler, just to camp on this one a little bit more. Other than funding, is there other barriers that keeps governments from moving towards a modern digital infrastructure?

Tyler Kleykamp: Well, there's many challenges. I think the first, typically is the procurement process in states. And so I think the way states have approached procurement has been these large significant contracts that go where all the needs are supposed to be to find upfront. The term is typically called waterfall, because from a procurement perspective, we think we're buying a product but in most cases what we're actually buying are services. So that's the time of the software developers, and then states on their side need to obviously be more engaged in the development of these digital tools along the way. I think the other part, our legal challenges. So as we talk about, especially integrating data across different programs, generally each one of those programs have some type of law that says who you are and are not allowed to share data with and in what capacity. And it can be really challenging because the family education rights and privacy act has its own set of standards.

Tyler Kleykamp: HIPAA has another set of standards. And so figuring out what the sweet spot in the laws are that enable sharing of that type of data. It can be really challenging. And a lot of states simply don't have the legal support necessary, [inaudible] that's trying to integrate data across systems. So most of these attorneys are thinking, this is administered by the agency that I work for, I'm here to keep them out of trouble. And the easiest way to do that, is to be extremely conservative when interpreting laws. And so having an attorney whose job it is to actually figure out how to share data, would also be a significant step for states.

Jeff Harrell: Got it, that's great. Okay. So we've talked about three reasons. What's the fourth reason to use these funds to support infrastructure?

Setting Up Your State for Success

Tyler Kleykamp: Yeah. I mean, it's basically, you're setting up your state for success moving forward into the future. So putting this infrastructure in place now, it doesn't go away, right. So, it puts you in a position to continue leveraging and integrating data 10, 15 years down the line, obviously if you do it well. Because one, you can use this upfront influx of funding to get that initial capacity stood up, which is typically the most significant costs. And then it's really keeping up with the maintenance and upkeep moving forward. And I'll go back, in 2009 during the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Obama administration basically authorized states to leverage a very small percentage of the funding that came into those programs to establish the capacity to do the reporting and administration necessary or required, under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Tyler Kleykamp: And so when I worked in Connecticut, we leveraged that for a variety of things, but one of the things we did was, set up some data infrastructure that would allow us to pull together the different reports and measures from agencies, as well as the spending aspects of it. And when we put that technology in place, it was actually the precursor for a broader business intelligence tool that was put in on top of the state's financial information, that's still up and operational, and in use today.

Tyler Kleykamp: So that same type of thing can be done here in states. And it's a great way as well, to have a place to start that you can grow from. So that's the idea is like, with states, local government, you're getting some additional funding and a very small percentage of what you're going to get out of that, if it's applied towards putting some data infrastructure in place, it's going to pay dividends down the road. And as another example, in Indiana, through their management and performance tab, and they're a fairly mature data organization, but the return on investment for them has been four to one. So they're returning $4, for every $1 they've invested in that platform. And so the business case is right there for states to run with.

Jeff Harrell: And Tyler, I know you said that that investing in data infrastructure allows you to use data-driven problem-solving. Tell us a little bit more about what that means.

Tyler Kleykamp: Yeah. So in the same way, we might be looking to say through the recovery process, well, how can we prevent homelessness or resolve homelessness by integrating data across these different sectors? You can use that same approach to, down the road I think address housing and housing issues that aren't specifically related to recovery. So maybe it's a lack of affordable housing or a lack of access to housing, maybe it's that homeless individuals are also receiving a variety of different state services. And so that sets you up down the road to be able to integrate data across those systems and better deliver those types of services, or even as we talk about supporting small businesses. Again, governments do all types of small business support programs, whether it's loans, grants, that type of thing. So these are all challenges that states are leveraging data to address them today. They'll be set up to do similar things moving forward.

Jeff Harrell: That's great Tyler. So... Sorry, hang on. My outlook clicked. I forgot to turn it off before we started this. I think we're in the last one, this would be the investment in both long- and short-term success. Okay. All right. So Tyler bring us home, this is our last of the five reasons, it's an investment in both short and long-term success.

A Real Opportunity for Government

Tyler Kleykamp: Yeah. So reiterating the trailing end of my point before is, the ability to share and integrate data across a variety of programs, I think it's something most people that work in government agree, it needs to be done. And if you one, focus on some recovery related use cases, it helps you better serve your residents, it helps you make better decisions now, and it really lays the groundwork for the culture and the ability to do this moving forward. And so as they say, never let a good crisis go to waste type of statement, I think there's a real opportunity here for governments who are, I think a light has been shown on data, especially at the state level. So I don't think ever in our history I can recall a time where governors were standing up in press conferences and not only using charts and data, on a daily basis but actually using data to make decisions in basically, real time.

Tyler Kleykamp: So as case numbers change, governors decided whether to shut things down, whether to reopen things. As we started to learn more about the impacts of the pandemic, we started to see shifting policies and all that stuff. And so I think now that type of activity hopefully will continue. And putting that infrastructure in place, not only helped them to make improvements in their decisions as we progress for recovery, but ideally these things really take holding government and allow states, and local governments to simply keep doing this into the future and grow. And we've seen most of the successful efforts, where we're seeing this, and maybe more mature governments always start with some type of high priority use case. And then when they've generated success in there, they're able to scale that into other aspects of their work. And so this is a really good opportunity to say, "Okay, we're going to focus on these recovery related use cases with an eye towards growing our capacity into the future, to do this for improving traffic safety or making licensing requirements less burdensome on people."

Jeff Harrell: This has been very enlightening. Tyler, I'm going to run through the five real quick and then we'll see if you have any parting thoughts for us. But the first reason was, it's necessary for informed recovery. Two, it's vital for equitable recovery. Three, it builds a modern digital infrastructure, it allows for future data-driven problem solving. And then finally, it's an investment in both short- and long-term success. Tyler, any additional thoughts? Any parting thoughts for us?

Tyler Kleykamp: Sure. So I'll say that when we talk about this being an investment, it's not a significant investment when you look at the amount of funding that's coming to state and local government. So if state governments in particular, allocated one half of 1% of the funding that they got or that they are to receive, that would be a significant boost to developing this capacity. So for example, if a state were to receive $1 billion, which is less than most states will be receiving I believe, one half of 1% of that is $5 million. I hope I did my math correctly there. So it's basically allocating a rounding [inaudible] of the federal funding that they're to receive, to setting up some data infrastructure.

Jeff Harrell: That's great. Well Tyler, if someone wanted to connect with you, what's the best way for them to do that?

Tyler Kleykamp: Sure. You can find me on Twitter. I'm @TKleykamp or you can email me at tyler.kleykamp@georgetown.edu.

Jeff Harrell: Awesome. Tyler well, thanks so much for your insight. This has been very informative, really appreciate your time. And thanks so much for joining us.

Tyler Kleykamp: My pleasure, thanks for having me.