15 cities from North and South America are joining Bloomberg Philanthropies’ City Data Alliance. The new cities, including Boston, Denver, Austin, Kansas City, Toronto, Santiago, and Bogota, bring the number of cities in the City Data Alliance to 80 in some 12 countries and representing 78 million residents.

Established by Bloomberg Philanthropies in 2022 with a $60 million investment, the City Data Alliance is designed to help municipalities across North, Central, and South America with populations of 100,000 or more accelerate their data use to better serve their communities.

The City Data Alliance aims to address the needs of cities to incorporate and manage emerging technologies. It provides local governments with support to build strong data practices and apply digital and artificial intelligence tools to help improve cities and individual neighbourhoods.

The Bloomberg Philanthropies City Data Alliance is delivered in partnership with the Bloomberg Centre for Government Excellence (GovEx) at Johns Hopkins University. The City Data Alliance aligns with and builds on the success of the Bloomberg Philanthropies What Works Cities Certification, led by Results for America, a standard for data-informed, well-managed local government.

The 15 new Bloomberg Philanthropies City Data Alliance municipalities are:

The United States:

• Austin, Texas
• Boston, Massachusetts
• Dallas, Texas
• Denver, Colorado
• Kansas City, Missouri
• Newport News, Virginia

Canada:

• Toronto, Canada

Argentina:

• Vicente Lopez, Buenos Aires, Argentina

Brazil:

• Belo Horizonte, Brazil
• Porto Alegre, Brazil
• São Paulo, Brazil

Chile:

• Lo Barnechea, Chile
• Santiago, Chile

Colombia:

• Bogota, Colombia
• Medellin, Colombia

Participants receive technical assistance to up-skill staff and capabilities; access to innovation specialists to put residents at the heart of systems and policy-making; and a network of forward-thinking peers with which to exchange strategies.

Cities in the Bloomberg Philanthropies City Data Alliance have already:

• Used data to identify people at high-risk of gun violence in Baltimore, Maryland. The city employed a group violence reduction strategy that led to a historic reduction in homicides in 2023 and 2024, including a 33 percent murder drop in one of its most violent sections. Baltimore also worked with the City Data Alliance to launch a Data Academy, an online data training programme that will upskill over 500 city employees.
• Accelerated assistance programs, improved police recruitment, and streamlined housing applications in Seattle, Washington, backed by a citywide data strategy devised with residents in local hackathons. Today, applications for social benefits take just six minutes to complete – five times faster than before – and digital permitting has reduced costly corrections. The city’s police force now uses data to apply pay raises, reach more candidates, and speed up hiring.
• Prompted deployment of emergency and recovery resources in hurricane vulnerable Tampa, Florida. In 2024, during Hurricanes Helene and Milton, real-time data identified hard-hit locations, informed the delivery of aid, and made it possible for workers to remove 1 million cubic yards of debris and collect a football field’s worth of waste piled two feet high every day. As a result, Tampa met the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s deadline for removal three weeks ahead of schedule, enabling residents to resume their daily lives.
• Improved water service in Luján de Cuyo, Argentina, where desert-like surroundings and a growing population have strained the Tupungato River, the city’s only water source. With the programme’s support, the municipality can analyse live data, identify trends, and predict shortages so staff can respond quickly and plan ahead. A chatbot, Luji, now provides tailored water use recommendations so families can conserve the supply they need.
• Instituted a more effective response to extreme rainfall in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, where officials are using meteorological data to develop a real-time Early Warning and Alert System. Residents will be able to obtain fast, accurate, and reliable information on potential floods before they strike.

“Austin has an ambitious aim: to make our city the best place in America to be a kid,” said Mayor Kirk Watson of Austin, Texas. “By joining the Bloomberg Philanthropies City Data Alliance, we’ll accelerate our use of analytics, digital, and artificial intelligence to get there – creating the services, spaces, and experiences we need to get it done, and putting the policies and practices in place to ensure our city leads the way.”

“Ending street homelessness and getting people into permanent housing has long been a top priority in Denver,” said Mayor Mike Johnston on Denver, Colorado. “We have made historic progress towards achieving these goals by cutting street homelessness by 45% in just two years, and in partnering with the Bloomberg Philanthropies City Data Alliance I am confident that we will accomplish even more. The key to sustained progress is reliable systems built to last and keep our initiatives running long after we are gone, and this ambitious coalition of local leaders will help us tap into new technology to deliver the progress our residents deserve.”

“As Boston works to be a home for everyone and continues moving forward, it’s more important than ever to make smart decisions, use our resources effectively, and incorporate feedback and improvements to do more and better,” said Mayor Michelle Wu of Boston, Massachusetts. “The Bloomberg Philanthropies City Data Alliance accelerates data, digital, and AI within city governments so we can lead the way in delivering results. I’m grateful for our partnership with Bloomberg Philanthropies and look forward to Boston’s participation in this programme to better support our residents and families.”

“Data is a critical foundation for designing public policy, improving services, and governing effectively,” said Mayor Soledad Martínez of Vicente López, Buenos Aires, Argentina. “We are honoured to join the Bloomberg Philanthropies City Data Alliance and take our efforts even further—strengthening how we use analytics, digital tools, and emerging technologies, including AI, to better understand and respond to the evolving needs of our residents – especially those seeking new paths to grow, learn, and work.”

“The mayors in the Bloomberg Philanthropies City Data Alliance will be on the forefront of harnessing data, analytics, and AI to tackle urban challenges—and seize opportunities,” said Latricia Boone, interim Executive Director of the Bloomberg Centre for Government Excellence at Johns Hopkins University. “Their municipalities will serve as hubs of innovation—integrating the latest technology to modernise services, streamline permitting, mitigate disasters, and look ahead – in service of improving the outcomes that impact lives daily.”