Executive Summary/U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)

Executive Summary

HUD's Bureaucracy Busting Flagship Initiatives

Establish an Innovation Lab to Fuel Program and Support Area Performance Improvements
Proactively Allocate Homelessness Prevention Resources Utilizing Predictive Analytics
Build a Business Practices Exchange for Housing Providers to Share Ideas
Identify and Update Outdated Policies and Practices

The President's Open Government Initiative represents a major change in the way Federal Agencies interact with the public. HUD recognizes that open government is about more than new technologies and programs-it is about leveraging new ideas to improve the way the Department serves its customers. Whether through the creation of unique partnerships with other Agencies or the timely dissemination of HUD's data, the Department has identified ways to utilize the principles of transparency, engagement, and collaboration to increase mission efficiency and efficacy.

HUD has created a comprehensive plan that takes into account the specific culture, policy, and technology issues that need to be addressed in order to leverage open government to serve HUD missions. This plan describes the approach and key initiatives through which the Department will utilize open government to more effectively implement HUD's strategic plan. Through open government, HUD seeks to:

Increase Transparency by:

Making HUD's processes, activities, and regulations more open, accessible, and transparent both internally and to HUD's many stakeholders
Improving access to and the timeliness of HUD's financial and mission-related information by proactively making data available online in consistent, open formats, while protecting privacy, security, and confidentiality

Encourage Engagement by:

Creating public online forums to solicit feedback from HUD's customers and guide that feedback into actions that improve mission performance
Providing the public with the online ability to review and provide feedback on proposed rule changes before they are implemented

Drive collaboration by:

Creating an exchange where mission related organizations, HUD stakeholders, HUD personnel, and state and local officials can openly share and discuss ideas and best practices and provide feedback on what works and what needs improvement
Providing community-based non-profits access to tools and guidance to aid their establishment, sustainability, and effectiveness as force multipliers in their communities
Continuing to develop HUD's collaborative relationships with other Federal agencies to more effectively implement HUD's strategic plan

These efforts will enhance HUD's ability to achieve its strategic goals by utilizing open government as a tool to this end. The Department's strategic goals are to:

Strengthen the Nation's housing market to bolster the economy and protect consumers
Meet the need for quality affordable rental homes
Utilize housing as a platform for improving quality of life
Build inclusive and sustainable communities free from discrimination
Transform the way HUD does business

The following pages provide an overview of HUD and its mission (Chapter 1), the approach the Department took to determine how open government could most effectively assist HUD's strategic goals (Chapter 2), HUD's bureaucracy busting flagship initiatives (Chapter 3), transparency initiatives, (Chapter 4), engagement initiatives (Chapter 5), collaboration initiatives (Chapter 6), and the challenges to utilizing open government (Chapter 7).

HUD's flagship open government capstone concept is bureaucracy busting. Bureaucracy busting is about fundamentally changing the way that HUD does business, and making the Department more efficient, proactive, flexible, and communicative. This plan includes multiple bureaucracy busting flagship initiatives that are all new and innovative, and that will enable the Department to reduce the number of unnecessary, time-consuming, and redundant processes, and to streamline interactions with HUD's stakeholders. These initiatives will receive priority support and resources as necessary.

Since the Open Government Plan is a living document, the list of flagship initiatives in this document is by no means final. As HUD continues to adapt and innovate, old initiatives may be modified and new initiatives may be added. The following table provides a high level description of the Department's bureaucracy busting flagship initiatives, each of which is further detailed in Chapter 3 of this plan.

HUD's Flagship Initiatives

Number	Flagship Initiatives	Description
FS-1	Establish an Innovation Lab to Fuel Program and Support Area Performance Improvements	Establish an innovation lab to incubate novel and unique ideas and tools that enhance HUDs mission performance. Leverage the innovation lab to break through bureaucracy barriers to quickly turn ideas into improvements.
FS-2	Empower Communities to Combat Homelessness Utilizing Predictive Analytics	Utilize data assets from throughout the Federal government in order to build predictive models and map based visualizations of communities that are trending towards increased levels of homelessness. Data can be leveraged from HUD, Commerce, Labor, Health and Human Services, and others in order to gain insight into communities that are at risk of increased homelessness. This data will be shared with the public in map form as well as raw data form via Data.gov.
FS-3	Build a Business Practices Exchange for Assisted Housing Providers to Share Ideas	Create an online capability through which assisted housing providers can share and discuss successful programs and ideas for service delivery.
FS-4	Identify and Update Outdated Policies and Practices	Collaborate with HUDs customers and stakeholders to identify and update business policies and practices within HUD.

Each of these flagship initiatives has been selected due to their support of multiple elements of the HUD Strategic Plan. The following table provides a snapshot of which of HUD's strategic goals are supported by each of the flagship initiatives in this Open Government Plan.

HUD's Flagship Initiatives Mapped to HUD's Strategic Goals

Number	Flagship Initiatives	Goal 1	Goal 2	Goal 3	Goal 4	Goal 5
FS-1	Establish an Innovation Lab to Fuel Program and Support Area Performance Improvements	X	X	X	X	X
FS-2	Empower Communities to Combat Homelessness Utilizing Predictive Analytics	X	X	X	X	X
FS-3	Build a Business Practices Exchange for Assisted Housing Providers to Share Ideas	X	X	X	X	X
FS-4	Identify and Update Outdated Policies and Practices	X	X	X	X	X

Transparency initiatives are projects that will help HUD publish its information online in useful formats and in contexts that help the public. The following table provides a high level description of HUD's transparency initiatives, each of which is further detailed in Chapter 4 of this plan.

HUD's Transparency Initiatives

Number	Transparency Initiatives	Description
T-1	Ensure HUD Regulations Are More Easily Available and Usable Online	Provide HUDs rules and regulations in a centralized, machine-readable, online format that is easy to use, share, search, and download.
T-2	Publish HUD-Assisted Housing Locations and Related Information	Make HUD-assisted housing location data available online in a centralized, machine-readable, online format that is easy to use. Make the data available as a service so that other websites can leverage the data for maps and other uses.
T-3	Make Housing Related Laws More Accessible to the Public	Put decisions online in a centralized, machine-readable, online format that is easy to use, share, search, and download.
T-4	Utilize Web 2.0 and Social Media Tools to Inform and Educate the Public and HUD Personnel	Utilize Web 2.0 and social media tools such as YouTube to create media informing the public about HUDs services and how these services can be leveraged. Also leverage these capabilities to provide training internal to HUD.
T-5	Create an Enterprise Wide Data Inventory and Storage Service	Create a list of the data that HUD maintains and capture standard metadata so that it can be shared as appropriate. Proactively plan to phase in additional sharing of data through initiatives like Data.gov.
T-6	Create an Online Directory of Major Points of Contact within HUD	Create a directory that will enable the public to more easily find and contact HUD offices and personnel. Ensure that the directory is usable in a variety of formats.
T-7	Create Foreign Language Resources at HUDs Field and Headquarters Offices	Create foreign language capabilities to better serve HUDs non-English speaking customers.
T-8	Participation in Federal Transparency Initiatives	Continue to utilize tools such as Data.gov to proactively share information with the public.

Each of these transparency initiatives has been selected due to their support of multiple elements of the HUD Strategic Plan. The following table provides a snapshot of which of HUD's strategic goals are supported by each of the transparency initiatives in this Open Government Plan.

HUD's Transparency Initiatives Mapped to HUD's Strategic Goals

Number	Transparency Initiatives	Goal 1	Goal 2	Goal 3	Goal 4	Goal 5
T-1	Ensure HUD Regulations Are More Easily Available and Usable Online		X	X	X	X
T-2	Publish HUD-Assisted Housing Locations and Related Information	X	X	X	X	X
T-3	Make Housing Related Laws More Accessible to the Public				X	X
T-4	Utilize Web 2.0 and Social Media Tools to Inform and Educate the Public and HUD Personnel	X				X
T-5	Create an Enterprise Wide Data Inventory and Storage Service	X		X		X
T-6	Create an Online Directory of Major Points of Contact within HUD					X
T-7	Create Foreign Language Resources at HUD’s Field and Headquarters Offices		X	X	X	X
T-8	Participation in Federal Transparency Initiatives		X		X	X

Engagement initiatives are projects that will create opportunities for the public to participate throughout HUD's decision-making processes. The following table provides a high level description of HUD's engagement initiatives, each of which is further detailed in Chapter 5 of this plan.

HUD's Engagement Initiatives

Number	Engagement Initiatives	Description
E-1	Provide Improved Online Feedback Capabilities for Customers	Allow the public to provide feedback through a variety of channels, aggregate and track the feedback, and provide responsive actions based on it.
E-2	Provide Online Capabilities for Public Review of HUD Regulations Prior to Implementation	Provide mechanisms through a variety of channels so that the public can review and provide comment on regulations prior to their implementation.
E-3	HUD Ideas in Action: A Strategic Planning and Open Government Tool	Provide the public with ways to provide innovative ideas and ensure that HUD enables these ideas to improve the Department’s services.
E-4	Transforming Rental Assistance	Create a unified and standardized process for managing HUD’s relationship with rental assistance programs and provide better customer service to its customers.

Each of these engagement initiatives has been selected due to their support of multiple elements within the HUD Strategic Plan. The following table provides a snapshot of which of HUD's strategic goals are supported by each of the engagement initiatives in this Open Government Plan.

HUD's Engagement Initiatives Mapped to HUD's Strategic Goals

Number	Engagement Initiatives	Goal 1	Goal 2	Goal 3	Goal 4	Goal 5
E-1	Provide Improved Online Feedback Capabilities for Customers		X	X	X	X
E-2	Provide Online Capabilities for Public Review of HUD Regulations Prior to Implementation		X			X
E-3	HUD Ideas in Action: A Strategic Planning and Open Government Tool			X		X
E-4	Transforming Rental Assistance	X	X	X	X	X

Collaboration initiatives are projects that will help HUD revise its current practices to further cooperation with other Federal and non-Federal government Agencies, the public, and non-profit and private entities in fulfilling the Department's core mission activities. The following table provides a high level description of HUD's collaboration initiatives, each of which is further detailed in Chapter 6 of this plan.

HUD's Collaboration Initiatives

Number	Collaboration Initiatives	Description
C-1	Provide Tools to Community-Based Non-Profits to Act as Force Multipliers	Provide community-based non-profits access to tools and guidance to aid their establishment, sustainability, and effectiveness as force multipliers in their communities.
C-2	Utilize the Department of Energy’s Weatherization Assistance Program as a Catalyst for Additional Collaboration to Aid HUD’s Customers	Expand existing efforts to help residents of HUD-assisted housing weatherproof their homes. Increase collaborations with Department of Energy so that information is more readily available via online channels that are appropriate for HUD’s customers.
C-3	Continue Collaboration with the Federal Communications Commission on Broadband	Build on efforts to help residents of HUD-assisted housing obtain broadband internet access to enhance the nation’s economic base.
C-4	Continue Transportation Related Collaboration with the DOT and EPA	Continue to strengthen HUD’s partnerships with the DOT and EPA to focus on transportation planning and sustainable growth.
C-5	Continue General Communication with the Public	Continue HUD’s public facing engagement activities associated with its Office of Public Affairs.

Each of these collaboration initiatives has been selected due to their support of multiple elements of the HUD Strategic Plan. The following table provides a snapshot of which of HUD's strategic goals are supported by each of the collaboration initiatives in this Open Government Plan.

HUD's Collaboration Initiatives Mapped to HUD's Strategic Goals

Number	Collaboration Initiatives	Goal 1	Goal 2	Goal 3	Goal 4	Goal 5
C-1	Provide Tools to Community-Based Non-Profits to Act as Force Multipliers	X	X	X	X	X
C-2	Utilize the Department of Energy’s Weatherization Assistance Program as a Catalyst for Additional Collaboration to Aid HUD’s Customers	X	X	X		X
C-3	Continue Collaboration with the Federal Communications Commission on Broadband	X	X	X		X
C-4	Continue Transportation Related Collaboration with the DOT and EPA	X				X
C-5	Continue General Communication with the Public		X	X		X

This Open Government Plan is a living document. As HUD increases transparency, engagement, and collaboration, this plan will be refined and expanded with new ideas and initiatives.