In the latest effort to share City-collected data with the public, the Department of Commerce and the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability have released new datasets. Also, if you missed it, check out Part 1 of our Holiday wishlist featuring data on preventing home foreclosures.

The Department of Commerce

Commerce sets policies and provides programs to help both small businesses and major corporations thrive in Philadelphia and has now released additional data on their work:

  • The Business Security Camera Program dataset includes the location of new security cameras, the corresponding census tract and police district, and other variables. This program aims to enhance safety outside of establishments by reimbursing the costs of equipment and installment.
  • The InStore Program dataset lists recipients of forgivable loans, their location, the commercial corridor in which they reside, the fiscal year of receipt, and the loan amount. The InStore Program is a business attraction and expansion program that provides financial assistance to help eligible retail, food, and creative for-profit and non-profit businesses purchase equipment and materials associated with establishing a new location or expanding at an existing one on targeted commercial corridors.

Check out the City’s Business Services website if you’re interested in finding out more about the InStore Program and the Business Security Camera Program. Beyond improving general transparency in how Commerce is spending funds, releasing InStore Program data allows people to see where private investment is occurring on commercial corridors throughout the city. Similarly, the Security Camera Program shows the number of businesses taking advantage of a program that is designed to make Philadelphia safer. Both datasets demonstrate positive outcomes from Commerce programming.

The Mayor’s Office of Sustainability

As part of Greenworks Philadelphia, the city’s comprehensive sustainability plan, the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability implements an energy benchmarking program, which requires commercial buildings 50,000 square feet and larger to report and disclosure their energy and water usage annually. This release of 2014 data on Large Commercial Building Energy Benchmarking contains building and performance data for properties who reported, as well as a list of properties that did not report data. To learn more, read more about the benchmarking program and check out a map of energy performance.

More Resources

For other Commerce-related data, check out their previous releases on Storefront Improvement Grants, Economic Opportunity Plans, and the Office of Economic Opportunity’s Registry of Certified Minority/Women/Disabled Owned Business Enterprises.

The Office of Sustainability has also released benchmarking data on City-owned buildings, information about retrofitted homes in Philadelphia, and a virtual solar tour of different solar-technology projects in the city.

Keep in Touch

Share your ideas on or plans to use this data with data@phila.gov or join us on the public open data google forum. To find other available datasets from the City of Philadelphia, visit OpenDataPhilly.