GenIC Request Template

Request for genIC Approval

CDC/ATSDR Formative Research and Tool Development

0920-1154

CIO: National Center for Environmental Health

PROJECT TITLE: Formative Research to Develop an Open Data Standard for Reporting Environmental Health Data

PURPOSE AND USE OF COLLECTION:

Environmental health inspectors from local health departments conduct thousands of facility inspections around the country each year. There is a wide range in the type of facilities inspected including restaurants, salons, child care centers, hotels, and aquatic facilities. Environmental health inspectors generate tremendous amounts of environmental health data. Unfortunately, the inspectors do not always make this information available to the public that makes health decisions or to researchers hoping to improve surveillance and reduce risk to patrons.

CDC is working with the National Environmental Health Association (NEHA) through cooperative agreement (CDC-RFA-OT18-1802) to demonstrate how existing, taxpayer funded environmental health data can be made open, accessible, and usable by anyone. The European Commission defines open data as accessible data that anyone can use and share (European Commission 2019). The U.S. website Opendata.gov asserts that open data increases citizen participation in government, creates economic opportunities and informs public and private sector decision-making (GSA 2019). A potential outcome of this partnership effort is to elevate the quality of environmental health data collection, and to assure that collected data is accessible and usable by the public. The environmental health information targeted for use by this project is aquatic facility inspection data. However, if successful, the open data platform would be an appropriate tool for reporting environmental health data from any type of facility inspection in the future.

NEHA will conduct key informant interviews to inform the development an open data standard that will be useful to stakeholders, adaptable to all types of environmental health inspection data, and acceptable to facility owners and operators. The interviews will generate the data needed to help the development team describe the current open data reporting landscape, determine the information technology (IT) infrastructure required to implement open data reporting in local jurisdictions, and understand the critical challenges faced by similar efforts.

DESCRIPTION OF RESPONDENTS:

To inform the development of our open data standard we intend to conduct a limited number of interviews (43 or fewer) with open data standard experts, municipal government IT administrators, environmental health personnel, and technology providers. Snowball sampling will be used to identify interviewees.

CERTIFICATION:

I certify the following to be true:

1. The collection is voluntary.

2. The collection is low-burden for respondents and low-cost for the Federal Government.

3. The collection is non-controversial and does not raise issues of concern to other federal agencies.

4. Information gathered will not be used to substantially inform influential policy decisions.

5. The study is not intended to produce results that can be generalized beyond its scope.

6. The information gathered will inform ongoing practices.

Name: Brian Hubbard, MPH

To assist review, please answer the following questions:

Personally Identifiable Information:

1. Is personally identifiable information (PII) collected? [ X ] Yes [ ] No

Note: Only the minimum amount of PII necessary to conduct interviews will be collected by NEHA. No PII will be shared with or provided to CDC.

2. If Yes, is the information that will be collected included in records that are subject to the Privacy Act of 1974? [ ] Yes [ X ] No

3. If Applicable, has a System or Records Notice been published? [ ] Yes [ ] No

Gifts or Payments:

Is an incentive (e.g., money or reimbursement of expenses, token of appreciation) provided to participants?

[ ] Yes [ X ] No

BURDEN HOURS

Category of Respondent	BLS Classification	BLS Mean Hourly Rate	No. of Respondents	Burden in Hours	Burden in Dollars
Open Data Standard Expert	Computer and Information Research Scientists	$57.49	6	6	$344.94
Municipal Government IT Administrator	Computer/IT System Managers	$71.99	10	10	$719.90
Environmental Health Personnel	Environmental Science and Protection Technicians, Including Health	$23.71	20	20	$474.20
Technology Providers	Network and Computer Systems Administrators	$41.51	7	7	$290.57
Totals			43	43	$1,829.61
Source for pay data: https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm#45-0000

FEDERAL COST: The estimated annual cost to the Federal government is $3,803.81

Salaries and Wages
Position, Title and Name	Annual Salary	Rate/hr	Hours Required	Amount Budgeted
Director, PPD Sandra Whitehead	$116,610	$58.31	12.5	$728.81
Project Coordinator, Ayana Jones	$46,000	$23.00	25	$575.00
Consultant, Sarah Schacht		$100.00	25	$2,500.00
			Total Budget Calculated	$3,803.81

If you are conducting a focus group, survey, or plan to employ statistical methods, please provide answers to the following questions:

The selection of your targeted respondents

1. Do you have a customer list or something similar that defines the universe of potential respondents and do you have a sampling plan for selecting from this universe? [x ] Yes [ ] No

If the answer is yes, please provide a description of both below (or attach the sampling plan)? If the answer is no, please provide a description of how you plan to identify your potential group of respondents and how you will select them?

Sampling and Interview Plan: NEHA contracted with an open data subject matter expert (SME). This SME has completed an ecosystem scan that included the identification of online resources for aquatic facility inspection data. The SME developed a list of jurisdictions (state and local) with open environmental health data (including aquatic facility inspection data) and they developed a list of the most commonly used inspection database providers used by U.S. environmental health departments. These database providers provide services to large numbers of environmental health departments to help them maintain inspection data. Additionally, the SME identified points of contact for data standard experts from the UK’s head of data standards, the European Union’s lead agency on data standards, and experts from the United States that create standard terminology for data standards used by U.S governmental agencies. The SME will conduct targeted key informant interviews with the identified points of contacts from each respondent category. The SME will collect the key informant information by taking hard copy notes on their discussions. Afterward, the information will be logged into a spreadsheet, de-identified, organized, and will be provided to the CDC in a summary of results. At no time will CDC have access to any key informant interview transcripts. As needed, the SME will use a snowball sampling technique to recruit future interviewees that may hold valuable information related to open data portals and open data standards used by U.S jurisdictions.

Administration of the Instrument

1. How will you collect the information? (Check all that apply)

[ ] Web-based or other forms of Social Media

[ X ] Telephone

[ X ] In-person

[ ] Mail

[ ] Other, Explain

2. Will interviewers or facilitators be used? [ X ] Yes [ ] No

References

European Commission. What is open data? [online]. 2019. [cited 2019 march 19]. Available from URL: https://www.europeandataportal.eu/elearning/en/module1/#/id/co-01

United States Bureau of Labor Statistics. May 2017 National Occupational Employment Statistics. [online] 2019. [cited 2019 March 18]. Available from URL: https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm#45-0000/.

U.S. General Services Administration (GSA). Open Government. [online]. 2019. [cited 2019 March 19]. Available from URL: https://www.data.gov/open-gov/

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