Apps for Metro Chicago Illinois with Metro Chicago Information Center (MCIC) at the helm is the first civic apps comeptition to use an independent data intemediary. MCIC is a research, consulting and information resource committed to increasing the quality, quantity and accessibility of information and guided by a fundamental philosophy that better information produces better decisions. MCIC's role as designer and facilitator of Apps 4 Metro Chicago Illinois began over a year and half ago when MCIC’s President Virginia Carlson approached the City pointing out how a data intermediary guiding the Competition and facilitating public access to local governmental data was essential to the development of modern solutions that improve the lives and communities of Metro Chicagoans. The result is a groundbreaking civics apps competition that has united four government agencies to provide over 200 local and thousands of federal data sets, offering $50,000 in prize money, and resulting in collaborations and applications whose depth, dimension and potential have surpassed not only previous open data civic app efforts but also MCIC and the A4MC Team’s own expectations.
MCIC is committed to continuing and building on the great successes of the Apps 4 Metro Chicago Competition. MCIC hopes to continue to facilitate access to open data, sustain the apps and collaborations created during the competiton and encourage new ones. To do so we need your help! . With your support, we know we can preserve the commitment to open data, collaboration and innovation providing every community access to better data for better decisions!
