Coding Government Crowd Sourcing

" Government is at its core what we do together that we can't do alone." Tim O'Reilly

After several years of diminishing federal assistance municipal bureaucracy like the City of Coatesville's can use a little help from citizens. 

Crowd sourcing apps can link neighbors and people inside and outside of government bureaucracy with answers to problems and get things done. 

Jennifer Pahlka at TED

One crowd sourcing app is now in place in Coatesville, SeeClickFix. Things do get fixed. 
See:

City of Coatesville joins SeeClickFix

Some cities use apps to link to volunteer fireplug snow cleaners and volunteer snow sidewalk shovelers. 

I would like to see an app that could help to fight violent crime. Maybe it would be two separate apps; one to find suspects and one to prevent violent crime from happening. 

For instance, elderly and disabled people are justifiably afraid to walk in Coatesville alone. A "Walk Coatesville" app could link them with neighbors to walk together. It's just an idea, I don't know how it would work out. And I don't yet know how to write apps. 


This is a study that in my view opens windows to possibilities for a crime prevention app:

Connections Among People: Tracking and Preventing Violence through Social Network Analysis

Code for America Our Apps and Projects 

Thanks to Matt Baker for sending me this video:

JENNIFER PAHLKA AT TED [VIDEO]

The video coding used on the Code For America post doesn't work on some devices so I used the You Tube version.