Councilmatic is now an official NYC Council website
Big news: the NYC Council has created its own official version of Councilmatic: https://laws.council.nyc.gov/
We’re tremendously excited by this announcement today and have decided to shut down the previous version of our non-profit NYC Councilmatic site —
…but there are plenty of other unique community dialogue tools we could build on this code, with charitable funding support, so get in touch, email me: david at ppolitics.org.
For example, wouldn’t it be useful to have more free email notifications for staying in touch with what’s happening in your NYC Community Boards? We have a non-profit funding prospectus ready to share, open-source as always.
Other cities, such as those with Code For America Brigades, get in touch to bring a version of Councilmatic to your area. Features: mobile-responsive, powerful search, member lookup, and especially free email notifications for event agendas, keywords, and even complex search queries. Email us: info at councilmatic dot org.
Big congrats to NYC Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, her entire office, and especially the community tech & innovation team headed by Joyce Li.
Congrats to DataMade, Councilmatic’s tech lead, on doing the development work on this open-source app, using new official Legistar API.
More info: I’m very excited that the NYC Council has picked up Councilmatic, meeting the local information needs of NYC residents. The past few years have been a very productive era of partnerships with NYC government and civic tech projects, and Councilmatic becoming an official NYC Council web resource is yet another tremendously positive outcome. Launching an official government version of Councilmatic is further evidence of the deep commitment of Speaker Mark-Viverito and her digital team to accessible and responsive government. Councilmatic is a leading open-source app for user-friendly access to legislative information — open-source and mobile-responsive, to stay in touch with what’s on Council meeting agendas even if residents can’t attend city government events in-person during weekdays.
Now, thanks to the leadership of Speaker Mark-Viverito, NYC residents can receive free email notifications from the NYC Council itself about what’s happening in their community. Crucially, the new site is powered by open data about every legislative activity in the NYC Council, so more developers can remix and customize information for their communities. Email is a timely and handy tool for tracking what’s happening in Council: your Council members’ activity, committee hearings, meeting agendas, custom search terms, even the nickname of your NYC neighborhood.
My great compliments to the Speakers’ office digital team and DataMade, as open-source tech leads, on launching this exciting, valuable, and unique public resource. More cities can now follow the lead of the NYC Council in bringing a version of Councilmatic to their area, with powerful search & alert features for greater inclusion and accessibility. Thanks to the Rita Allen Foundation for the grant that supported the creation of NYC Councilmatic in 2015–2016, including an innovative public dialogue program with community groups and participating NYC Council offices. Thank you to everyone who participated in our public comment program.
Contact: David Moore, Councilmatic, david at ppolitics dot org. Go team, go NYC Council partners.
Added Wed., Dec. 20th — video of Council announcement, 15:30m in to this video — it’s possible to skip ahead pretty close to that time, though can’t permalink to it exactly — announcement lasts one minute, with transcript image following. Very grateful to Speaker Mark-Viverito’s office & team.
