Topic: NAP Time! An opportunity to provide input into the commitments of Canada's 2025-29 National Action Plan (NAP) on Open Government! Join in the discussion and have your say on where you would like to see improved transparency, accountability, and public participation in the Government of Canada in four key areas: • Meaningful and Inclusive […]

Topic: Crowdsourcing care: Solving healthcare service gaps with open data and civic tech Join us for a talk about open data and civic tech as we look at Fern, a crowdsourced web app designed to help residents of Toronto find family doctors who are currently accepting new patients. With over 2 million Ontarians without a family […]

Topic: Empowering Climate Action in Every Language This presentation introduces a powerful Multilingual Climate Chatbot, designed to bridge the gap in climate education for all Torontonians, especially youth and marginalized communities. Built on advanced Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) architecture, this chatbot uses fine-tuned embedding models and hybrid search to cut through the disjointed, jargon-heavy climate information […]

Topic: Noise Cameras: New Tech to Solve an Old Problem Are you tired of the loud vehicles on our streets? Many are! Join us to hear from the manufacturer of noise cameras that are in use in 8 cities on 3 continents, including New York City. Speaker: Reuben Peckham is Director of Intelligent Instruments, which produces SoundVue cameras. He has […]

Topic: The evolution of retail business: Bloor Street between Spadina and Christie For the past 30 years, Prof. Martin J. Osborne has conducted an annual survey of street-level businesses on Bloor Street between Spadina and Christie. For each business, he has recorded its name, the type of goods or services it offers, and any ethnic […]

Topic: Crowdsorsa Katja Boutou introduces Crowdsorsa – an innovative platform that uses gamification and crowdsourcing to tackle environmental and infrastructure challenges. Through paid microtasks, citizens collect data or take action—such as mapping invasive species, assessing road conditions, or removing harmful plants—helping municipalities and organizations address pressing issues efficiently and affordably. Speaker: Katja Boutou is a […]

Topic: Climate Voting Records Toronto Climate Voting Records Toronto (https://votingrecords.climatefast.ca/) is your go-to interactive tool for tracking how Toronto City Council votes on crucial climate and environmental policies. Stay informed, hold the mayor and councillors accountable, and see where they stand on key issues like transit, cycling, food, TransformTO, energy, climate justice, and more. Speaker: […]

Topic: Would data help you depute at City Council meetings? At this talk, Veronica Yeung (an employee on the City of Toronto's Open Data team) will talk about the reports that City staff write to support City Council's decision making – what are they? How do they fit into the democratic process? Where can you […]

Topic: Gray Hat Social Media – Surveying Online Political Discourse in the Public Interest Social media has become the place where we see news and talk politics, but it is also rife with intrigue and manipulation. In this presentation, Dr Alexei Abrahams will share with you the tools and techniques being developed by public interest […]