The CAPCOG Community and Economic Development Division has developed a regional data dashboard to assist communities in making informed decisions and preparing for economic recovery related to the COVID-19 pandemic. It also collaborated with Travis County, Austin and other partners on a second more in-depth dashboard so local leaders in the county could better understand how the response to the pandemic impacted the county’s economies.
Mobilizing verified data for communities is important when it comes to disasters. In some cases, the sooner data can be processed, the quicker organizations can develop recovery strategies. Dashboards are effective for visualizing concentrated data from multiple sources in one central location. The CAPCOG dashboard pulls data from US Census Bureau, Bureau of Labor, and Texas Workforce to depict the economic conditions the region is experiencing. This visualized data allows policy makers to understand the economic magnitude of the COVID-19 pandemic and where impacts are most significant. Using the information can lead communities to working with targeted stakeholder groups to strengthen recovery efforts. Examples of such efforts could be supporting industries hit the hardest with more local loans or stimulus or working with trade associations to implement faster re-employment strategies as businesses return to normal.
See the Travis County dashboard.
Both dashboards will continually be updated as more information becomes available and is deemed valuable to the projects.
