Mayor Deegan Launches Interactive Census Data Hub for Jax Residents

A New Era of Data-Driven Decision-Making in Jacksonville

In today’s world, anyone can become a policy expert in Jacksonville. This is the core idea behind the newly launched "State of Jax" initiative introduced by Mayor Donna Deegan. The program aims to provide a transparent and comprehensive view of the city by analyzing data that highlights its strengths and weaknesses across various areas such as the economy, health, education, and more.

The initiative was announced on August 5, with University of North Florida President Moez Limayem joining Deegan. Limayem shared insights from a similar assessment conducted in Tampa Bay when he was a dean at the University of South Florida. He explained how local leaders once used "vanity rankings" to attract a major company, only to find out that the company had done its own research and knew more about the region's challenges than the officials themselves.

“This company knew more about Tampa Bay’s challenges than we actually did,” Limayem said. “What I rediscovered is that facts don’t disappear just because they’re ignored. We can ignore them, but others are looking at them.”

Accessing the Data

The information about Jacksonville is available online at stateofjax.org, where the city uses mySidewalk to pull from 2,000 datasets compiled by the U.S. Census Bureau, the Centers for Disease Control, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and other sources.

Currently, the data compares Jacksonville to the United States, the state of Florida, and 13 other peer cities. Within Jacksonville, the site compares each of the 14 City Council districts. In the future, the analysis will expand to include comparisons by ZIP codes and Census tracts, allowing for more detailed community-to-community comparisons.

Cost and Implementation

Setting up the "State of Jax" initiative comes with a cost. The city will pay $200,000 for access to mySidewalk data for two years. Additionally, there are $37,500 expenses for branding, website development, and related materials.

Mayor Deegan emphasized that the data will guide how the city creates policies and allocates taxpayer dollars in specific communities and neighborhoods. She hopes the initiative will take the politics out of arguments, even if it’s a lofty goal.

“My dearest hope — I'm just going to say it — is this takes the politics out of arguments,” she said. “And I know that's a pipe dream on a lot of levels, but what we are doing here is fact-finding.”

She added that having the data on hand will enable decisions based on “this is the reality that we are dealing with, so let's in fact deal with it.”

Cities Compared

Jacksonville will rank itself against 13 other cities, including three in Florida: Miami, Orlando, and Tampa. Other cities include Indianapolis, San Antonio, Louisville, Charlotte, Philadelphia, Columbus, Ohio, Nashville, Denver, Austin, and San Francisco.

From there, the city will drill down within Jacksonville through comparisons by City Council district, smaller areas defined by ZIP codes, and then by individual communities in Census tracts. Parvez Ahmed, a UNF economics professor serving as chief of analytics in the mayor’s office, noted that the data allows for a more granular look at the city.

“We can see what the inside of the city looks like — where the disparities are,” Ahmed said. He added that while the gaps identified by the data won’t always require government programs, bringing them up for discussion can help nonprofits coordinate their services more effectively.

Partners in the Initiative

In addition to UNF, the city’s partners include the Jacksonville Civic Council, United Way, the Nonprofit Center, Community Foundation, and Jacksonville University. These organizations play a key role in supporting the initiative and ensuring its success.

The "State of Jax" initiative represents a significant step forward in making data accessible and actionable for both policymakers and residents. By providing a clear picture of the city’s strengths and challenges, it aims to foster informed decision-making and collaboration across different sectors.