In 2013, New Yorkers wrote this roadmap for an incoming administration. In 2026, with another new administration at City Hall, we scored all 34 recommendations against the public record: local laws, executive orders, city program pages, and press accounts. Every status below links to a source.
The count: 11 of 34 recommendations fully realized (eight enacted in law, charter, or executive order, three running as programs or partnerships), another 18 partially realized, four that never happened, and one that was dissolved. At least 16 local laws and a voter-approved Charter amendment advance ideas this roadmap championed.
"In 2013, through the People's Roadmap to a Digital New York City, BetaNYC argued that New York City must put the City Record online in a machine-readable format."
Office of the Mayor, announcing the signing of Local Laws 37 and 38 of 2014
Enacted law or charter provision Adopted running program or partnership Partial real movement, short of the ask Superseded overtaken by events Not realized
| # | Recommendation | Status | What happened | BetaNYC's role | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | "We the People of NYC" petition tool | Not realized | Four Council bills, four sessions, all died in committee (2014–2025). | We backed the ask; the bills tracked it. | Int 614-2024 |
| 2 | Track FOIL requests publicly | Enacted | OpenRecords portal (2016+), mandated by Local Law 199 of 2025. | The roadmap urged the open-source codebase the City used. | LL 199/2025 |
| 3 | FOIL: "once opened, always open" | Enacted | FOIL-to-open-data review, Local Laws 7 of 2016 and 244 of 2017. | We testified through the amendment era. | Open Data Law |
| 4 | Expand the Mayor's Office of Data Analytics | Enacted | Codified into the Charter by Local Law 222 of 2018; now the Office of Data & Analytics inside OTI. | We testified for codification. | LL 222/2018 |
| 5 | Expand Code Corps | Not realized | The program vanished in the 2014 transition; no successor. | None documented. | 2014 archive |
| 6 | Empower NYC Digital and the Chief Digital Officer | Partial | The CDO role ended in 2017; agency design labs emerged; OTI consolidated tech in 2022. | We stayed engaged across every version. | GovTech, 2017 |
| 7 | Municipal fiber network | Partial | Internet Master Plan (2020) shelved in 2022; Big Apple Connect serves NYCHA; Local Law 153 of 2025 mandates recurring broadband plans. | We testified at the 2020 and 2025 hearings. | LL 153/2025 |
| 8 | Mesh networks and Digital Stewards | Partial | RISE:NYC funded resilient mesh (2015); NYC Mesh grew community-run; no municipal program. | None documented. | RISE:NYC |
| 9 | Ensure iZone's success | Superseded | Dissolved 2014–2017; the technology-in-schools agenda moved to CS4All. | None documented. | Chalkbeat, 2014 |
| 10 | Digital toolkits for schools | Adopted | Computer Science for All (2015–), now in 91% of schools; equity goals unmet. | None documented. | CUF, 2025 |
| 11 | Invest in Made in NY startups | Partial | NYCEDC vehicles continue (Catalyst Fund, Founder Fellowship); the pension-fund idea never moved. | None documented. | NYCEDC |
| 12 | Better software procurement | Partial | PASSPort digitized the paperwork (2017+); the process itself is unreformed. | None documented. | PASSPort |
| 13 | Digitize business permits | Partial | NYC Business portal (2017), MyCity Business (2023); paper workflows persist. | None documented. | Small Business First |
| 14 | Put the City Record online | Enacted | Local Law 38 of 2014; City Record Online and its open dataset are live today. | Documented: the Mayor's signing release credits this roadmap by name. | LL 38/2014 |
| 15 | More innovation and app challenges | Partial | BigApps ended in 2019; NYCx faded; NYC Open Data Week endures. | Documented: we co-produce Open Data Week with the City. | ODW 2025 |
| 16 | Overhaul DoITT; elevate the CIO/CTO | Enacted | Executive Order 3 of 2022 consolidated the tech offices into OTI under a CTO. An EO, not a law: a future mayor can undo it. | We called for the reorganization in budget testimony. | EO 3, 2022 |
| 17 | Look to open source practices | Partial | A Citywide GitHub Policy (2016) and open-source city tools; the FOSS procurement act died twice. | We testified for the FOSS Act. | GitHub Policy |
| 18 | More cross-agency task forces | Partial | DART and SMART faded; the function moved into MODA and agency Open Data Coordinators. | We testified for the structures that replaced them. | EO 306 |
| 19 | Mayoral Innovation Fellows | Partial | City Hall declined. We built the Civic Innovation Fellowship with the Manhattan Borough President in 2014; it still runs. | Documented: it is our program. | CIF |
| 20 | Publish data in data standards | Enacted | Local Laws 106–110 of 2015 and successors; the Technical Standards Manual governs publishing. | We testified for data dictionaries; they became LL 107. | LL 107/2015 |
| 21 | Restaurant inspection data via LIVES | Adopted | The 2013 Yelp partnership; the inspection dataset is live and updating today. | None documented; it predates the roadmap. | Dataset |
| 22 | Grow the Open311 standard | Partial | A read-only 311 API exists; there is still no standards-based way to submit a service request. | We build public tools on the 311 API today. | 311 API |
| 23 | Open up NYC's maps | Partial | PLUTO freed (2013), the crime map (Local Law 39 of 2013), planimetrics on the portal. | Our community fought for PLUTO and built on it. | PLUTO |
| 24 | Creative Commons for city content | Not realized | NYC.gov remains All Rights Reserved. | None documented. | Terms of Use |
| 25 | Citizen user-testing groups | Partial | The Service Design Studio (2017) tests with residents project-by-project; no standing corps. | None documented. | Studio |
| 26 | A data literacy academy for communities | Adopted | Open Data Ambassadors, School of Data, and community board trainings deliver it. | Documented: the City calls Ambassadors "a collaboration between NYC Open Data and BetaNYC." | Ambassadors |
| 27 | A one-stop shop for citizen information | Partial | ACCESS NYC (2017), then MyCity (2023), which the Comptroller found is not yet a true one-stop. | None documented. | 2025 audit |
| 28 | Notify NYC on more platforms | Partial | An app, 13 languages, geotargeted alerts: the goal is substantially met. | None documented. | App launch |
| 29 | Equip community boards with better tools | Partial | BoardStat (2017), a website mandate in Local Law 211 of 2018, and Civic Engagement Commission support. | Documented: we built BoardStat with the Manhattan Borough President. | BoardStat |
| 30 | Expand participatory budgeting | Enacted | Charter §225-a via the 2018 ballot; "The People's Money" runs citywide, still under-resourced. | We testified to the Charter Revision Commission for expansion. | 2018 ballot |
| 31 | Put the Charter, Rules, and Code online | Enacted | Local Law 37 of 2014. Free online today; machine-readable open access still rides on a vendor. | Documented: we ship the open access layer ourselves. | LL 37/2014 |
| 32 | Human- and machine-readable records | Partial | The open data amendments and Local Law 29 of 2019 cover much of it; PDFs persist. | We testified through the amendment era. | Open Data Law |
| 33 | "Yelp.gov" for NYC agencies | Not realized | Aggregate satisfaction dashboards exist; no public rating platform. | None documented. | 311 dashboard |
| 34 | A Department of Neighborhoods | Partial | Never a department; the Public Engagement Unit, the Civic Engagement Commission, and now the Office of Mass Engagement (EO 7, 2026) carry the function. | We argued for institutionalized engagement at the 2018 Charter Revision. | EO 7, 2026 |
We assessed each recommendation on two separate questions: did the idea happen, and can we document our own role in it? "Documented" appears only where a source explicitly connects the outcome to BetaNYC or this roadmap; advocacy on the same topic without such a source is listed as engagement, not credit. Statuses reflect the public record as of July 17, 2026. Found something we missed? Open an issue.
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