Sarah Schacht (pronounced "shot")
Sarah Schacht is a consultant for a variety of "civic" organizations and "gov tech" companies. At her consulting firm, Smarter Civic, Schacht prototypes and tests new programs for clients. Schacht's work mitigates bureaucratic challenges and builds revenue strategies. Schacht's work includes international sales for an open data company, saving a civil society organization $65,000 per month, and building a $5 million earned revenue plan for an 80-year-old nonprofit.
She has over 10 years of experience in developing open governance, open data, community engagement, and transparency technology strategies. As a social entrepreneur, she founded an "open gov" 501(c)3 nonprofit, Knowledge As Power (2006-2012). Schacht is a frequent advisor to governments ranging from small-town mayors to presidential staff. She is passionate about open data, data standards, citizen engagement, open government, and government technology.
Public Health and Open Data
Schacht is a food safety advocate. She launched a campaign for posted restaurant inspection scores in King County, Washington. In January 2017, King County (Seattle) launched posted scores. It's estimated to save two to three lives and prevent 118,000 foodborne illnesses per year. She also consulted to Socrata and worked with Yelp on restaurant inspection data. With Socrata staff, Schacht developed the 2.0 version of the LIVES Data Standard for restaurant inspection data. From late 2018 through the present, Schacht designed and led the National Environmental Health Association's (NEHA) aquatic data standard program, a project funded by the US Center for Disease Control. Her work with NEHA includes an ecosystem scan of over 1,000 environmental health agencies's data, drafting a new data standard in partnership with technical contractors, and working closely with stakeholders at local, state, and federal levels.
Event Coordination and Community Engagement
From 2009 through 2012, Schacht founded and ran a series of open government/civic technology conferences called Open Gov West, bringing thousands of government staff from across the West Coast together with technologists, civic organizations, and journalists to build open government knowledge and networks. Open Gov West completed its run with six events in two US states and the Canadian Province of British Columbia.
Public Speaking
Schacht frequently speaks at conferences and events on open government, open data, gov tech, consumer and technology perspectives on food safety, and citizen engagement topics. For speaking requests, please contact her via the email address below.
Personal Life
Schacht lives in Seattle with her husband and their big-boned cat. She's an avid surfer and gardener. Schacht serves on a neighborhood board, initiates community projects like Replant Roosevelt, and serves on a Washington State public health committee and NEHA's informatics committee.
Contact Information:
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Market Research for a Civil Society Organization Developing Focus Groups to Test Service Concepts on Mayors in Washington State. 2016-2017 Link | Revenue Strategy Development with Altruist Altruist brought Schacht on to provide open government expertise and revenue generation strategy for a civil society organization. Results: a 5 million dollar revenue strategy based on earned income and the ability for the organization to expand capacity. 2016-2017 Link | Community Engagement for Socrata Speaking at client conferences to educate governments on open data standards in 2015. Developed thought leadership on LIVES data standard, $29,000 of revenue on "non-revenue" program. 2015-2016 Link |
Market Research for a Civil Society Organization
Developing Focus Groups to Test Service Concepts on Mayors in Washington State. 2016-2017 Link
Revenue Strategy Development with Altruist
Altruist brought Schacht on to provide open government expertise and revenue generation strategy for a civil society organization. Results: a 5 million dollar revenue strategy based on earned income and the ability for the organization to expand capacity. 2016-2017 Link
Community Engagement for Socrata
Speaking at client conferences to educate governments on open data standards in 2015. Developed thought leadership on LIVES data standard, $29,000 of revenue on "non-revenue" program. 2015-2016 Link
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Civic Technology Startup Government Engagement Strategy Researched market needs, produced government engagement strategy and earned media strategy. Resulted in news coverage of Pawzii and partnerships with county governments. 2015 Link | Operations Director & Lead Researcher, Philanthrogeek Worked directly with exceptionally large philanthropic organizations in Seattle and the Bay Area on producing social media and community engagement strategies on topics of higher education and equity in the technology workforce. Produced research, the majority of reports, worked directly with the leadership of foundations. Ran operations for the startup consultancy. Example of public speaking on behalf of Philanthrogeek: Link 2014 | Open Knowledge Fest "Open Gov" Track Co-Chair Coordinated open government track of the "fest" in Berlin. Reviewed over 100 applications and coordinated topic areas, speakers, and facilitated an opening session on the main stage. 2014 Link |
Civic Technology Startup Government Engagement Strategy
Researched market needs, produced government engagement strategy and earned media strategy. Resulted in news coverage of Pawzii and partnerships with county governments. 2015 Link
Operations Director & Lead Researcher, Philanthrogeek
Worked directly with exceptionally large philanthropic organizations in Seattle and the Bay Area on producing social media and community engagement strategies on topics of higher education and equity in the technology workforce. Produced research, the majority of reports, worked directly with the leadership of foundations. Ran operations for the startup consultancy. Example of public speaking on behalf of Philanthrogeek: Link 2014
Open Knowledge Fest "Open Gov" Track Co-Chair
Coordinated open government track of the "fest" in Berlin. Reviewed over 100 applications and coordinated topic areas, speakers, and facilitated an opening session on the main stage. 2014 Link
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Mentoring Parliamentary Transparency Project in Argentina 2013 Mentored the Argentine civil society organization Directorio Legislativo on government outreach strategy, which resulted in the Argentine Senate releasing machine-readable financial documentation of Argentine Senator's office expenditures. Brought in talented probono data scientists to assist with publishing the data in a searchable database. 2013 | Mentoring Product Transparency App Development As a Transparency and Accountability Initiative project mentor, worked with Environmental Working Group's team to launch the Skin Deep App, which saw 50,000 downloads in its first month. 2013-2014 Link | Usability Study Management, Seattle City Light Hired by the Conservation Department at Seattle City Light to build a usability study of Seattle City Light's website and client engagement resources. 2012-2013 Link |
Mentoring Parliamentary Transparency Project in Argentina
2013 Mentored the Argentine civil society organization Directorio Legislativo on government outreach strategy, which resulted in the Argentine Senate releasing machine-readable financial documentation of Argentine Senator's office expenditures. Brought in talented probono data scientists to assist with publishing the data in a searchable database. 2013
Mentoring Product Transparency App Development
As a Transparency and Accountability Initiative project mentor, worked with Environmental Working Group's team to launch the Skin Deep App, which saw 50,000 downloads in its first month. 2013-2014 Link
Usability Study Management, Seattle City Light
Hired by the Conservation Department at Seattle City Light to build a usability study of Seattle City Light's website and client engagement resources. 2012-2013 Link
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Usability Report on Seattle.gov KAP produced this report on a limited budget, changed internal support for the website redesign, and Seattle.gov's redesigned site won "Best Municipal Website in America" the following year. Schacht completed 1/2 of the research within the report and led focus groups, stakeholder engagement, and overall program strategy. 2011 Link | Overview of Knowledge As Power & Open Gov West Programs, 2011. Examples of Knowledge As Power's work through products like KAPcitizen (a legislation tracker based on open data), Open Gov West conferences and events, and KAP's civic engagement trainings. Link | Conference Coordination & Sponsor Enagement Raised over $50,000 in sponsorships for Open Gov West events between 2009 and 2011. Provided over 100 scholarships for government and nonprofit attendees in the US and Canada. Coordinated three conference boards, all conference stagings, location coordination, and final speaker list approval. 2009-2012 Link |
Usability Report on Seattle.gov
KAP produced this report on a limited budget, changed internal support for the website redesign, and Seattle.gov's redesigned site won "Best Municipal Website in America" the following year. Schacht completed 1/2 of the research within the report and led focus groups, stakeholder engagement, and overall program strategy. 2011 Link
Overview of Knowledge As Power & Open Gov West Programs, 2011.
Examples of Knowledge As Power's work through products like KAPcitizen (a legislation tracker based on open data), Open Gov West conferences and events, and KAP's civic engagement trainings. Link
Conference Coordination & Sponsor Enagement
Raised over $50,000 in sponsorships for Open Gov West events between 2009 and 2011. Provided over 100 scholarships for government and nonprofit attendees in the US and Canada. Coordinated three conference boards, all conference stagings, location coordination, and final speaker list approval. 2009-2012 Link
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LIVES Standard Home Page Developed by Smarter Civic, LivesStandard.com contains the history of LIVES, the best practices guide authored by Schacht (while consulting to Socrata) and guidance for implementation of LIVES. 2017 Link | LIVES Accelerator program Schacht Coordinated for Socrata Designed, deployed a data standards accelerator program for a 10-government cohort with governments ranging from small towns in Texas to the Food Standards Agency of the UK. 2015-2016 Link | Organized 1st American Akoma Ntoso Training After training on Akoma Ntoso in Italy, Schacht brought the parliamentary/legislative data standard's experts to a training hosted at an international think tank in DC. Attendees included members of Library of Congress, the Clerk's Office, and leading open data organizations. 2012 Link |
LIVES Standard Home Page
Developed by Smarter Civic, LivesStandard.com contains the history of LIVES, the best practices guide authored by Schacht (while consulting to Socrata) and guidance for implementation of LIVES. 2017 Link
LIVES Accelerator program Schacht Coordinated for Socrata
Designed, deployed a data standards accelerator program for a 10-government cohort with governments ranging from small towns in Texas to the Food Standards Agency of the UK. 2015-2016 Link
Organized 1st American Akoma Ntoso Training
After training on Akoma Ntoso in Italy, Schacht brought the parliamentary/legislative data standard's experts to a training hosted at an international think tank in DC. Attendees included members of Library of Congress, the Clerk's Office, and leading open data organizations. 2012 Link
Media Coverage of Schacht's Open Data & Standards Work
- Recognition of Schacht's thought leadership in GovTech Magazine, by Stephen Goldsmith of Harvard University in early 2016. Link
- Schacht managed partnership coordination with Yelp for Socrata, and worked with municipalities to launch 2.0 of LIVES data standard on open data portals and surface data to Yelp. Local news coverage of LIVES launching.
- Coordinated event creation, sponsorship, and speaker recruitment, between Socrata and Center for Open Data. Spoke on the panel with fellow open data thought leaders.
Open Gov Content, Research, Writing
- Open Data Census Provides a To-Do List for States, Government Technology Magazine, March 2016.
- Chapter, "Democracy Under Everything," in O'Reilly Publishing's 2010 compendium, Open Government in Practice.
- Posts on Medium.com, on civic engagement, surveillance, and a variety of topics, 2014-2017.
- Fast Company blog Article Schacht wrote on a new White House petition service.
- Civic engagement classroom curriculum for middle schools developed by Knowledge As Power. Creative Commons licensed.
- Op-Ed in The Oregonian, "Government technology: Modernizing for our money's worth"
News & Press from Knowledge As Power & Open Gov West
- Fast Company story on Schacht's work in the open gov space.
- Tech Flash Story on Open Gov West, the open government conference series she founded and chaired.
- Contributing to social media in politics story, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
- Featured as a "Rainmaker" in Seattle Met Magazine
Food Safety Advocacy
- Early news coverage of Schacht's work to get posted restaurant inspection scores in King County, Washington. 2013 articles.
- 2014 front-page story from Seattle Times where King County announces it will post restaurant inspection scores, complying with the petition Schacht put forward. Schacht would continue to hold King County accountable to its commitments through 2017 when scores finally launched.
- Numerous articles on Schacht's work in Food Safety News, a major news source for the public health and environmental health community.
- In Dine Safe King County, Schacht founded an independent research study and report to produce restaurant inspection score usability research when King County had not done so on its own. Recruited five usability researchers from the University of Washington to independently complete the study. Fundraised for its completion and led earned media outreach.
- TV news coverage of posted restaurant inspection scores launching in King County Washington, after four years of advocacy, coordination, and stakeholder engagement.
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Speaking on a NEHA Panel with Experts from the CDC in 2016 | Open Knowledge Fest 2014 in Berlin, Germany. Schacht co-chaired the open government track. | With the Akoma Ntoso Training Class in Ravenna, Italy in 2011. |
Speaking on a NEHA Panel with Experts from the CDC in 2016
Open Knowledge Fest 2014 in Berlin, Germany. Schacht co-chaired the open government track.
With the Akoma Ntoso Training Class in Ravenna, Italy in 2011.
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Knowledge As Power's Q3 Team with Blue Angels | In Rome, at Lunch with Parliamentary Monitoring Groups & Civil Society Leaders |
Knowledge As Power's Q3 Team with Blue Angels
In Rome, at Lunch with Parliamentary Monitoring Groups & Civil Society Leaders
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Meeting the Afghan Delegation at the UN ICT for Parliament Meeting in Rome | With the Mobilize.org's team after keynoting their conference |
Meeting the Afghan Delegation at the UN ICT for Parliament Meeting in Rome
With the Mobilize.org's team after keynoting their conference
