Results for America

Join Results for America’s Jen Tolentino tomorrow at 3pm EST for a webinar hosted by the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities - LEO - at Notre Dame and J-PAL North America to explore how local government leaders are embedding research, data, and evidence into budgeting processes. There’s still time to reserve your spot!

🔗 RSVP here: https://forms.gle/jjni9W4WtkftkctB6

From Line Items to Impact: Incorporating Evidence into Local Budgeting An Evidence Matters Webinar Many local governments have taken steps to evaluate the community impacts of specific programs and have used such analysis to support funding decisions. But how do we move from making ad hoc decisions about what gets evaluated to building a consistent focus on data and ev...

As partners of The EdRedesign Lab at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, we’re excited to invite you to a powerful virtual event: the premiere of DREAM ON’s new episode on the transformation of Spartanburg, SC’s Northside neighborhood.

In this episode, you’ll see how a cross-sector coalition of residents, local government, school district leaders, and a backbone organization came together to:

➤ Cut violent crime by 77%
➤ Raise 3rd-grade reading proficiency from 6% to 48%
➤ Build hundreds of units of new housing
➤ Open a new community center
➤ Create a state-of-the-art early learning center

📅 Date: Tuesday, June 2, 2026
🕛 Time: 10:00–11:00 AM ET
💻 Location: Virtual | Zoom Webinar

At this special launch event, you’ll be among the first to watch the episode and hear directly from the leaders behind this work during a live Q&A moderated by Rob Watson (Executive Director, EdRedesign) with:

➤ Jennifer Blatz, President & CEO, StriveTogether
➤ Dr. Russell Booker, CEO, Spartanburg Academic Movement
➤ Carol Naughton, CEO, Purpose Built Communities
➤ David Summers, CEO, Spartanburg Northside Development Group

This event is free and open to the public, but advance registration is required.

👉 Register here: https://edredesign.org/events/dream-spartanburg-sc

Please share this with your networks and join us to explore what’s possible when communities come together to rewrite a neighborhood story.

DREAM ON: Spartanburg, SC The EdRedesign Lab serves as a catalyst advancing the cradle-to-career field by promoting cross-sector community-based systems of support and opportunity for all children, especially those affected by racism and poverty.

📢 On June 2, join the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities - LEO - at Notre Dame and Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) (North America) for the next virtual session in their Evidence Matters Webinar series! The webinar will explore how local government leaders are embedding research, data, and evidence into budgeting processes. You’ll hear practical advice from local government leaders about how to get started and how to sustain momentum over time—building the internal capacity, cross-departmental partnerships, and political will needed to make evidence-informed budgeting a lasting part of how your government works.

Event Details:
🗓️ Date: June 2, 2026
⏱️ Time: 12pm PST / 3pm EST
👩🏾‍💻 Register here: https://forms.gle/jjni9W4WtkftkctB6

Featured speakers include:
Ricardo Basurto-Davila, Chief Evaluation Officer, County of San Diego - Government, CA
Ryan Flynn, Civic Design Researcher, The Lab @ DC
Jen Tolentino, Director, Local Practice, Results for America
Sam Quinney, Director, Yale for Connecticut Initiative, Yale Tobin Center for Economic Policy

In our latest story from The Department of What Works, Maycomb Capital’s Caroline Herriman and Shelby Kohn join Jeff Kositsky, Deputy Director of Housing Stability and Homelessness Resolution for the City and County of Denver Government, as guest writers to share how Denver is tying homeless shelter payments to performance, reducing administrative burden, improving data and helping shelter providers focus on moving people toward housing.

🔗Read the story today:
https://thedepartmentofwhatworks.substack.com/p/from-receipts-to-results-denver-redesigns

From Receipts to Results: Denver Redesigns $60 Million in Homeless Shelter Contracts By tying payments to performance, the city is reducing administrative burden, improving data and helping shelter providers focus on moving people toward housing.

In this week’s post in The Department of What Works, Ricardo Basurto-Davila, County of San Diego - Government’s Chief Evaluation Officer, shares how the county created an independent evaluation office to help answer key questions – like “are we investing in the right things, at the right scale, for the right populations?”

📰 Read the full story to learn more: https://thedepartmentofwhatworks.substack.com/p/how-san-diego-county-is-making-sure

“Counties and cities across the country are being asked to do more with less, and to show the impact of their work. The answer to that challenge is not more reporting. It is building the institutional capacity to ask whether our investments are working, and making sure the answer gets to people who can act on it,” writes Ricardo Basurto-Davila, Chief Evaluation Officer for the County of San Diego - Government in our latest post from the Department of What Works.

🔍 Learn how San Diego’s independent evaluation office is connecting rigorous evaluation to the policy and budget decisions that shape the lives of 3.3 million San Diegans.



Read the full story today! ⬇️

How the County of San Diego is Making Sure Its Spending Delivers Results An independent evaluation office is connecting rigorous evaluation to the policy and budget decisions that shape the lives of 3.3 million San Diegans.

"We've always done it this way" is our least favorite sentence. 🙅‍♂️

If you’re a state leader who dreams of a world where school district budgets are driven by evidence rather than inertia, this webinar is for you.

On May 19 at 1 p.m. ET, we’re gathering state education leaders to brainstorm how to move from "compliance-first" to "outcomes-first." We’ll be doing a "Friction Audit" to find out what's stopping LEAs from being strategic and how states can help clear the deck.

Come for the insights, stay for the chance to finally stop "rolling over" the same budget and start moving the needle for kids.

🔗https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/kOIsenr0TA-xzK016J8ANg

Did you know that What Works Cities now has a new Instagram page?

Follow their new page to learn how a growing community of over 100 cities across the Americas is using data to better deliver services and solve problems for residents!

Follow them here: 👉 https://www.instagram.com/whatworkscitiescertification/

“At the City of Long Beach, we are clear-eyed about both AI’s promise and its risks,” says Małgosia Rejniak, the Program Manager of AI and Data Governance for Long Beach City. “Move too quickly, and we risk data privacy concerns, fragmented one-off projects, and eroding public confidence. Move too slowly, and we miss opportunities to improve services and outcomes.”

In our latest Substack post from The Department of What Works, Rejniak shares the City of Long Beach’s journey to make engagement and transparency the starting point for using AI to improve services and build public trust.

📰 Read the new story here:
https://thedepartmentofwhatworks.substack.com/p/building-trust-first-how-long-beach

Budgeting is one of the most powerful tools we have to change students’ lives.

But let’s be real: state-level "friction" (think: rigid cycles and siloed grants) can make strategic spending feel like an uphill battle for school districts.

🗓️ Join us on May 19 at 1:00 p.m. ET for an interactive working session for state education leaders where we’ll talk about how states can be the "ultimate wingman" for local education agency leaders. Together, we’ll identify the hurdles and map out the pivots that can help local leaders put dollars where the data is.

🔗 Save your spot here: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/kOIsenr0TA-xzK016J8ANg