King County Metro and Notre Dame’s LEO lab are re-engineering social service delivery, codifying racial equity through a transformative researcher-practitioner model. This isn’t just data—it’s a co-creative learning pipeline designed for systemic change. Explore how rigorous evidence-building is redefining the value proposition of civic interventions.
Featured Speakers:
Betina Jean-Louis, Ph.D., Principal Consultant, Arc of Evidence Senior Advisor, Project Evident
David Phillips, Associate Research Professor, LEO
Jacqueline Kelley-Cogdell, Research Associate, LEO
Sara Sisco, Mobility Management Program Manager, Hopelink
Krisda Chaiyachati, Assistant Professor of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
Maria Jimenez-Zepeda, Reduced Fares Project Manager King County Metro
Christina McHugh, Regional Housing and Homelessness Evaluation Manager, King County Department of Community and Human Services
Partner with LEO
The Evidence Matters series is sponsored on ThinkND by the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO). Poverty is stubborn and requires the utmost collaboration of thought and action to drive change. People of goodwill must bring their unique strengths and positions together to solve this problem. At LEO, we believe knowledge has to be combined with action. But poverty can’t be solved by just one person, or even one sector. That’s why we bring together innovative social service provider partners, top-tier academics, philanthropists, policymakers, and others to tackle poverty.
Change is possible. And with your action, we can get one step closer to reducing poverty in our country, together.
In an era defined by complex social crises, the shift from extractive research to co-creative evidence-building is no longer optional—it is a strategic necessity. The “Evidence Matters” webinar codifies a sophisticated alternative to traditional, siloed policy design: the researcher-practitioner partnership. By bridging academic rigor with frontline expertise, King County Metro and the Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO) at Notre Dame have built a framework where data does not merely audit the past but actively engineers a more equitable future.
The LEO-King County Framework: A Learning Pipeline
Since 2017, this partnership has moved beyond “one-and-done” studies to cultivate a robust “learning pipeline.” This model allows projects to mature through various stages—from conceptual design to high-level data analysis—ensuring a constant flow of actionable insights. This longitudinal commitment facilitates real-time iteration; for instance, the partnership utilized a six-week feedback loop to mine customer data from initial relief efforts to refine the next phase of program delivery. This moves the needle from theoretical research to an agile, values-driven operational strategy.
Case Study Analysis: Nuance in Evidence
The partnership’s depth is exemplified by three core initiatives that move transit and housing research into the “leading edge” of social science:
Transportation Navigators: This project reengineers the approach to mobility by addressing “non-cost barriers”—cultural context, safety, and system literacy. By pairing Somali immigrants and persons with disabilities with mentors from their own communities, the evaluation focuses on qualitative outcomes like independence, social confidence, and long-term employment rather than just trip counts.
Subsidized Annual Transit Pass: To understand the “whole person,” the team integrated an interdisciplinary cohort including PRR (marketing specialists), health clinicians, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. This collaboration investigates how eliminating transit costs for the lowest-income residents serves as a health intervention, impacting mental well-being and social connectivity.
Emergency Rental Assistance (EP RAP): During the pandemic, the scale of need created a “natural experiment” involving $37 million in Phase 1 funding (and up to $177 million total). Because resources were inherently scarce, a lottery was required for distribution. This scarcity removed the “tricky ethical piece” of randomization, allowing researchers to rapidly evaluate the program’s impact on housing stability and homelessness prevention without adding administrative “red tape.”
Overcoming Structural Friction
The “soft side” of research—building trust and managing divergent priorities—requires a level playing field. Successful partnerships honor the “lower R” researcher—the practitioner whose internal data knowledge is as vital as academic “Capital R” Research. By centering the community as partners rather than subjects, King County and LEO ensure that evidence-based policy is built with the people it serves, resulting in the “best imperfect information” necessary for decisive, high-stakes leadership.
Prioritize Mission-Alignment Over Convenience: Early-stage research involvement prevents the “feasibility trap.” Instead of measuring only what is easy, researchers are nudged to design evaluations that track the program’s true purpose and core mission.
The Interdisciplinary Mandate: Complex social issues are multifaceted. Integrating clinicians and marketing experts into transit research allows for a “whole person” evaluation, capturing vital health and social outcomes that economic data alone would miss.
Ethical Randomization via Inherent Scarcity: During crises, “natural experiments” occur when resources are limited. Utilizing a lottery for scarce resources like rental assistance provides a rigorous counterfactual for evaluation without creating new ethical dilemmas or burdens for staff.
Solving for Non-Cost Barriers: Equity is not achieved by a price tag alone. Strategic partnerships must interrogate qualitative barriers—safety, language, and cultural navigation—to understand why service delivery succeeds or fails for marginalized groups.
Honoring Diverse Research Expertise: Effective partnerships depend on internal data capacity. Valuing the “lower R” researcher—the staff who bridge the gap between academic theory and operational reality—is fundamental to acting on data.
“I’m really passionate about advancing racial equity through bringing together our community partners, our research partners, and our staff… to work on being driven by our values and data and evidence informed.” — Carrie Chihawk, Lead for Learning and Impact Strategies and Partnerships, King County Metro
“We have a shared commitment to building evidence… in a way that is helping both people who are doing active service and creating these programs, but then particularly for the folks who are involved in those programs.” — David Phillips, Professor and Researcher, Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO) at Notre Dame
“We don’t want to do research to be frank on them, we’re doing research with them… having folks like David and Jacqueline as a part of this program allows us to shape those evaluation questions so that we can get feedback from the community.” — Sarah Cisco, Program Manager for Education and Outreach, Hope Link Mobility Management
“Everyone I’ve been working with is a researcher in their own way… we at least need to be doing a better job of being able to honor the different types of research expertise that everyone is bringing in.” — Maria Jimenez-Zepeda, Project Manager, King County Metro
“Localities are kind of little labs of policy right now… [the pandemic] has created a lot of opportunities for natural experiments. We had to have a lottery built in… and that removed the tricky ethical piece of randomization because it was just inherently a scarcity issue.” — Christina McHugh, Housing and Homelessness Evaluation Manager, King County DCHS
