Savannah Standard

Results for America has awarded the City of Savannah with the Bloomberg Philanthropies What Works Cities Certification. This recognition places Savannah among 21 new cities, including four in Canada, acknowledged for their exceptional data capabilities.

The certification standard requires municipalities to implement practices, policies, and infrastructure that effectively use data to inform policy decisions, allocate funding, improve services, evaluate programs, and engage residents. Savannah earned a Silver-level certification by upgrading 25 parks and recreation centers based on data concerning conditions and needs. This led to a 40% increase in pool attendance and a 37% rise in youth participation from 2023 to 2024.

The What Works Cities Certification measures a city's data use against 43 criteria. Meeting between 51-67% of these criteria results in Silver certification; fulfilling 68-84% qualifies for Gold; and achieving over 85% earns Platinum status.

This initiative represents a growing movement among local governments across the Americas investing in data-driven governance. The newly certified cities include Calgary, Edmonton, Hamilton, Winnipeg from Canada; Burlington in Vermont; Fort Lauderdale in Florida; Fort Worth in Texas; Newark in New Jersey; Oklahoma City in Oklahoma; Raleigh in North Carolina; Reno in Nevada; and Savannah in Georgia from the U.S.; Niterói, Rio de Janeiro, Belo Horizonte, Caruaru from Brazil; Corrientes, San Nicolás, Vicente López from Argentina; Maipú and San Fernando from Chile.

Launched by Bloomberg Philanthropies and led by Results for America since 2017, the What Works Cities Certification is recognized as an international standard of excellence for city governance using data. It is available to any city across North, Central or South America with a population exceeding 30,000.