Data Services

The San Diego Regional Data Library provides data acquisition, extracts and analysis services to nonprofits, news organizations and government agencies.

Pro Bono Projects

The San Diego Library is a non profit project and was established for a social mission, so we love to volunteer services, and the majority of our projects are pro bono.  We can often provide you volunteers for low priority, exploratory work. If your project, or a part of your project,  is appropriate for volunteers, we’re happy to discuss that with you during consultation.

Fixed Price Data Projects

If you have  a well defined set of questions to answer on a specific set of data and need more advanced skills, or more reliable output,  we can quote a fixed price. Fixed price projects work best when it is clear what data you will need and can specify a set of questions or requirements prior to the start of the work.

With fixed price projects you will get access to our internal project tracking system, and can follow the progress of each step of the project.

Hourly Rate Consulting

For exploratory projects that don’t have a fixed goal, or are otherwise not suited to a fixed price bid,  you can hire analysts at an hourly rate. We have a range of skills available, from basic data extraction, SQL queries, statistics, visualization and machine learning. Rates range from $95 a hour for most tasks, to $175 per hour for specialized machine learning, classification and prediction.

 

Data Use Fees

The Library maintains a collection of public data, pre-packaged and ready for analysis.  These packages are ready for analysts to use immediately, and because 80% of the typical data project is dedicated to acquiring, cleaning and preparing data, using pre-packaged data can significantly reduce the effort and cost for a project.

Datasets in our library are segmented, so you can pay for just the part of a dataset that your project needs, with bulk discounts for projects that use a lot of data segments.  Each data segment costs $125. The contents of a segment varies from dataset to dataset, but typically:

  • For national datasets, each state is a segment.
  • For multi-year datasets where each year is a separate data release, each year is a segment.
  • For the Census and ACS, each table for one state is a segment. 

Data projects usually have from 1 to 5 data segments. Data use fees are charged per job, regardless of whether you’ve used the same data segment for previous work.

For data that is not in the library, we can import data at your request, with a fixed price that depends on the difficulty of the work.  Most imports of simple spreadsheets can be done for $100, while imports that require special processing or techniques usually cost about from $600 to $2000. After the data is imported, you will be charged standard, fixed data use fees if you require the data for future jobs.

Data Ownership

After a project is complete, you will have full rights to use the deliverables for any purpose. SDRDL will retain rights to the programs used to generate the result. You will retain exclusive rights to data you own that is provided to us for use in the project.

Disclaimers and Limitations

We do our best to ensure that the data we release is complete, accurate and useful. However, because we do not create the data, and because the processing required to make the data useful is complex, we cannot be liable for omissions or inaccuracies. Therefore, we release all of our data “as is”, without warranty of any kind. Please see our website for the full Disclaimer of Warranty and Limitation of Liability.

Rates

  • Fixed price data projects: contact us for a quote
  • Hourly consulting:
    • Basic data and statistical work: $95/hour
    • Specialized skills: $175/hour
  • Data Use:
    • Per data segment: $125. Bulk discounts are available. 

Get Started

To get your data project started, contact Eric Busboom at eric@sandiegodata.org or 619 363-2607. We can discuss your needs and quickly give you a rough estimate.