(These are notes from the OpenGov Community Summit, hosted by the US Department of the Treasury on May 24, 2010.)

What can be done to help the OpenGov community evolve throughout 2010?  Who should do it? (Add your notes below in bullet-point form.)

Action Items for the OMB OpenGov Working Group

• There is no avoiding the need for leadership from the White House or an EOP agency (eg OMB, OSTP) with the ability and experience to manage and push a collaborative interagency effort.  If the White House continues to lead, the agencies and the private sector will continue to follow.
• Need to publish the minutes/decisions from OMB’s Open Gov Working Group meetings – at least on MAX site, for Federal employees to view. 
• Data.gov needs to establish a plain language policy – need to have a short explanation for all entries w/ideas on how the data may be used and manipulated for public good. 
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Action Items for OMB 

• Ask for "Lessons Learned" in a structured format 
• Find a way to determine how the public is using the data provided by agencies 
• Focus on problem-solving and measurement of outcomes through introduction and improvement of open government processes.
• Some agencies have policies that require the release of all underlying data used to support any publically released reports.  OMB should consider a gov’t-wide policy for this, w/PII (personal information) stripped out. 
• OMB should encourage agencies to conduct experiments and pilots for open gov and to report on results. 
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Action Items for GSA 

• Convene a summit to build the infrastructure for a vibrant open gov community (ie. standard methods of reporting and communicating best practices, FAQ's, definitions, etc) 
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Action Items for Agencies in General

• Agencies should consider hosting open.gov chat lines, at specified times, to improve public engagement. 
• Re measurement, need to use recognized customer satisfaction index tools and supplement w/anecdotes. 
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Action Items for OSTP's Ideation Community of Practice 

• Create a single location for Best Practices 
• Establish guidance to assist agencies in citizen engagement
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Action Items for the OpenGov Community in General 

• Bring state and local governments into the OpenGov community as equal partners.  Policy development at the federal level has a long history of experimentation and testing at the state and local level.
• Agencies/departments are in very different starting points in meeting OpenGov principles and have differing abilities to achieve the goals of OpenGov due to privacy and security issues. Somehow these differences need to be addressed and agencies/departments need to be evaluated appropriately. A one-size-fits-all approach or evaulation methodology yields misleading results. 
• Right now, OpenGov is being led or run out of varying offices/functions across agencies/departments (IT, CFO, Secretary's Office, GC, etc.). Does the sponsoring office really matter? How does it impact the success of OpenGov in that agency/department? Does OG need a common home? It's worth reviewing and considering. 
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