Open Data in the Legislature: The Case of São Paulo City Council

Open government data (OGD) policies in Brazil are still relatively recent. The beginning Open Government Data Portal came in 2011. However, according to Matheus, Ribeiro and Vaz (2012), it is possible to find a number of open data policies in national and subnational governments across Brazil: particularly at the states and municipality level.

In this paper, which forms one part of a multi-country study titled “Opening the cities: Open Government Data in local governments of Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay” we explain how OGD emerged in São Paulo and explore the impacts that OGD policies are producing on local civil society and private sector, we highlighted the local initiative from São Paulo City Council.

São Paulo City Council is a pioneer in open data policies in Brazil in three ways: a) it had one of the first open data policies in the country – starting this in June, 2011 through a law that created the Open Data Parliament Program; b) it is one of the few initiatives that are led by the legislative branch of government at the subnational level in Brazil; and, c) it was the first public organization that held a Hackathon in Brazil. 

The São Paulo City Council Open Data Portal was launched before the federal government Dados.Gov.Br portal, going online in September 2011, whilst the federal portal was first presented to public in June 2012.
Therefore, the objective of this paper is to present the case study of the São Paulo City Council