23 Civic Tech as a Movement with Dawn McDougall
This episode features [Dawn McDougall](https://twitter.com/de_mcdougs), Senior Advisor and former Executive Director of [Code for Philly](https://twitter.com/CodeForPhilly).<br>We hop into a discussion about what it means for Civic Tech to be a movement and we gain some insight into how Code for Philly does community organizing.<br><br>##### Music Credit: [Tumbleweeds by Monkey Warhol](http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Monkey_Warhol/Lonely_Hearts_Challenge/Monkey_Warhol_-_Tumbleweeds)
Top Keywords
- philadelphia 0.011
- civic 0.010
- community 0.009
- philly 0.008
- civic tech 0.007
- gritty 0.006
- tech 0.006
- work 0.006
- code philly 0.005
- technology 0.005
- different 0.005
- brigade 0.004
Transcript
Hello. I'm Ryan Cook, and this is Civic Tech Chat, a podcast about the civic technology movement. We seek to harness the power technology has to improve the delivery of public services to people everywhere. Welcome back for for another episode of Civic Tech Chat. This time, we're joined by Dawn McDougall, current senior advisor for Code for Philly, as well as their former executive director, and she's also a business operations and client engagement manager for Promptworks. We'll be having a discussion about the idea of civic tech as a movement, as well as learning a bit about how Code for Philly does community organizing. Before we hop into the discussion, please also take the time, if you've enjoyed our programming, to hop on over to your podcast app and give us a five star review. Doing so helps out the program as we try to reach a greater audience, and it helps encourage us to keep on making this high quality content. So with all that said, let's hop right in. Don, thank you so much for joining us here on Civic Tech Chat this time. Could you introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about what you do?
Yeah. Thanks so much for having me. So a little bit more about myself and what I do. I ran Code for Philly for a number of years from 2015 to 2018 and now, play a role in a senior adviser capacity. In addition to that, I also sit on the National Advisory Council for Code for America representing the Northeast Region. And my day job that I, you know, actually get paid for, that small detail, I work at a small software consultancy that build custom software applications for, cities I'm sorry. Not cities for, companies all over the country, but primarily in the city of Philadelphia.
Now one of the common theme questions we have here on Civic Tech Chat revolves around this idea of personal why. What is that for you? What what drives you to get out of bed each morning and do what you do?
That's such a great question. And I think for me, a large part of it is being able to have influence and actually be able to impact things. And I think that was one of the big components of civic tech that was so attractive, from a very, very early stage was being able to roll up your sleeves and get some things done. So I think, for me, really being able to have ideas and see those ideas come to fruition and be able to influence, either people or organizations or just ideas in a positive way, is is incredibly, motivating for me.
Now, as many folks might know, on LinkedIn, there's usually there's a section on each profile, which it kinda, like, lets you sort of free form say what you will about yourself is, like, the first thing someone might see. You're quoted as saying, I often describe my career as something I fell into. Could you talk a little bit about that and maybe, like, use that as an excuse to take us on the journey you went through developing your career?
Yeah. Of course. So I went to school originally for environmental studies and marketing and, sustainable urbanism was ultimately the major that I created for myself. I was very fortunate that I was able to custom design what I wanted to study. And what I was looking at there was really, government and governance and things like, networks and sustainability and and how do these all things come together to really form places that people can live and thrive. And when I was getting ready to graduate college, I actually ended up, in my senior year, doing some community based research that led me to Code for Philly. And at Code for Philly, I was just so amazed and awestruck by the mission and the people who were so passionate about that mission and using their skill set to really make a difference, and not a difference in five years or ten years, but a difference today and tomorrow and and just continual impact. So I started getting more involved in this community group that had been, you know, using technology and data to act as a mode of civic engagement, and I started getting more and more involved, taking on more and more. And ultimately, after I graduated college, decided decided that I didn't wanna go to grad school and instead I wanted to try to make Cote D'Ivoire a thing, quote, unquote. I really wanted to try to, turn it into a nonprofit organization and make it a sustainable center for civic tech in Philadelphia. And, throughout that journey, I I started to learn a lot about technology and how do we think about technology and how is it not only an industry, but a community and a community of practice and sort of getting a handle on the frame of reference that, that we have when we talk about these solutions and how does that fit into, the community element. And so as I just learned more and more and got more interested in the industry and the practice and the topics, I just continue to pursue that. So ultimately, we didn't make Coachero Philly a nonprofit. We did not end up pursuing that further after a certain point, but I did get into government technology and I worked in government technology for a little bit. I was at a small company called New Civic that ultimately was acquired by GovDelivery who provides, communication solutions among other things for, governments all across the country, and they actually were acquired by another company, Granicus. And then ultimately, after being there for a while, decided to move into the private sector to continue to build out that skill set in terms of the software development and how do teams get formed and how do you really deliver software. And so that is sort of the arc of how I ended up in a place where there's quite a lot of focus on software development and practice and how do you do it sustainably. So a lot of similar things being directed, in a different, sort of different direction, but ultimately using a lot of those skill sets for both the civic tech world and software technology, and looking at the overlap and using those things to inform one another to to be better at both.
So a term you mentioned at the beginning of that, I believe you're you're talking about starting your own major around it, which is pretty cool in of itself. But you mentioned the term sustainable urbanism. Could you talk a little bit about what that means? And and also since you've built a major around it, maybe, like, what that experience is like doing something like that.
Sure. Yeah. So sustainable urbanism was drawing it's a multi disciplinary, pursuit. So it isn't necessarily, like, a thing or a discipline in and of itself, But the the basic premise is that you are looking at cities as structures and really understanding how do you make those structures sustainable, not just from an environmental perspective, but economic, political, social, all kinds of stuff. So, the experience was really to take, you know, looking at history, looking at social studies and social science, looking at marketing, looking at, politics, and how do political structures and political history inform the way that people are governed, civic engagement and participation, how do people participate in the places that they live. But really at the heart of that was all to really think about how can cities, be places that we become attached to and and places that we want to invest back in. Because to me, cities are very much these, centers of innovation, and there's a lot of opportunity to leverage that innovation for social good, whether that be government or even nonprofits or other sort of social ventures. Unlike other places, you know, I I came from the suburb. You know, there's there's certainly nothing wrong with living in the suburbs or other parts of the country. But I do think cities, are situated in a quite unique fashion and have a quite unique set of resources that, position it quite well to be able to have a different level of impact and influence. And so the goal was really to say, how can we make this model that seems to be re reemerging this resurgence of interest in cities? How can we perpetuate that, and get people more excited about that? And the experience of the major itself was really great because I got to do both, academic study, but because I went to Drexel, which is a very hands on experiential learning, in institution, there was a lot of hands on research doing, what are called co ops. It's essentially like a six month job leave to be able to go and, like, work in industry and work in, the field. So it was a highly experiential experience, highly, interdisciplinary experience that I think ultimately created a a a healthy holistic picture of what, that image could be. And ultimately, as I learn more about technology, I continue to ask myself, how does technology play a role when technology is just changing everything that we think in all of our assumptions? So, that is sort of how those things both, you know, got me interested in in tech, but also, I could see the connection kind of bringing it back to technology.
Now before we go into more serious things again, I'd like to have us take a little break from the serious, and we're gonna go into a little section that's all about old tweets. So it turns out you do have some I'm so excited. And yours, start in 2011. So that's so imagine yourself at that time. And your Oh, god. No. Oh, yes. 2011 Don is is is is emerging. And, actually, I have to say, your first tweet is way more cultured and grammatically correct than mine ever was and probably many others. Yours is a tweet know. At ericamiram. Thanks for reading and great conversation tonight. Hopefully, we'll see you at another performance in New York. So I've got, like, two questions about that. Well and well, one question and observation. One is that that sentence has a semicolon in it, and it's actually used appropriately on Twitter, which is mind blowing. That's hilarious.
And the second is, did you get to see that another performance? Did that did that happen? Because I believe, this person's a poet. Correct? A pretty notable one. Yes. Oh my gosh. You're so good at research. So first of all, I just have to say, I was totally against ever using Twitter. The the fun fact about me and technology is that because I was so into the environment when I was a kid, I, like, refused. I, like, rebelled against technology because I thought thought that it was, like, hurting the environment. I was like, no. I hate technology. So in 2011, I had got to gotten to college and just was like, oh, okay. I have to do this. This is a thing. And so what that performance was was exactly what you said, was a poetry reading. And it was just a really interesting experience. And sadly enough, I did not see another performance of hers, but I should. And now you're you're, reinspiring me to go back into some of the poetry readings that I I had thought that, I thought that I was gonna get into poetry and writing and ultimately didn't, but, it is a great it was a great reading and a great book that she had. I actually still have it.
Well, you know, the SymitecChat is all about promoting patronage to the arts there. And and, actually, discovering that poet through your first tweet, I'm totally gonna be consuming a bunch of their writing here myself. I I I got around to look at, like, the first couple of surface things while I was researching, but, they seem like a pretty enticing poet
as well to go deeper.
Now it's funny you mentioned that, like, you were very against Twitter be for the next one because you did not tweet for three years after that. It was, like, I'm on tweet number one, and now I'm I'm off the face of the Earth.
Exactly.
Now there was a there was some tweets that came back, and I guess it was 2014. And one of those is kind of an interesting comment that I'd like to if you remember the, like, context, I'd like to see if there's more about the meaning of the statement. Is you quoted, someone named, Rich Negron who, if I'm pronouncing that right, who I believe is currently a deputy mayor in Philadelphia?
He was the managing director up until I want to say that was 2015, I think. He left with the previous administration. So, yeah, 2015, maybe 2016.
But your the tweet you're it was like a quote that you got from him that says, nationally recognized, Philly criticized.
Yes. Okay. Yes. I I remember that entirely. So, I think that this was at a conference that he was speaking at, and it was for something called Chili Rides, which was a program of his. And this is in North Philadelphia, and it was, it was engaging neighbors in that area residents in that area to talk about all the services that the city has, which is, like, so, like, three one one, something called CLIP where it's, like, basically picking up trash and getting rid of graffiti, all this stuff to, like, have beautification and, like, really enrich the lives of people there. And he was talking about this this thing that happens. This is phenomenon in Philadelphia where, nationally speaking, people are like, wow. Philadelphia is so ahead of the curve. They're leaders in this area. They're amazing. And in Philly, there's this interesting attitude where you, like that's, like, flashy and, like, you don't you don't wanna, like, you know, talk about yourself too much And, oh, Philly is not that great, and we don't do that much, and we're not that good. And it's insane because if you were to look at it objectively, you're like, no. We're, like, number one in, like, water quality and, like, the largest like, number one in large in large cities or whatever, something like that. But then everyone taught everyone in the city itself was like, oh, the water quality here is like, no. Objectively, it's good. So it was just a really distinct perfect way of capturing this really interesting attitude that Philadelphians have that sort of hold them back even though there are so many people doing amazing work here.
I I think what I'm hearing is that entire cities can have imposter syndrome.
Oh, good way of putting that. I can't tell if it's imposter syndrome or if it's just like like Philly was economically depressed for a really long time, and there was a lot of corruption in the city and the city government specifically. And so I think that I can't tell if, like, it's just people who have this old idea of Philadelphia and they it's just, like, permanent in their mind. You know how sometimes when you think about somebody you're like, you you you haven't seen them in ten years and in your mind they're the same exact person even though, like, they obviously changed a ton in that time. I wonder if it's the same thing with Philadelphia where it's like if you've been around when things weren't that good, it's hard to think about Philly being different, because, you know, that's just how you remember it almost.
I I think that makes a lot of sense. And and since we're on Philadelphia, I did have, like, written in the margins here in my notes a question that came to me that's why it's in the margins. This morning, while I was listening to another podcast that is very Philadelphia centric as a question. So if you have an opinion on this, we'll we'll leave this one unedited out. So on Gimlet, they have, like, the podcast reply all. And the episode that released today and for the for the listeners so that they're not lost on context, today is the fifteenth, which is a Thursday of November in 2018. They had an episode that's about gritty at the beginning and about it's like one of those, like, yeah, it's like the yes yes no segment where they there's a tweet that their boss, Bloomberg, comes and asks about. And while the basis of it is, I guess, that gritty has become like a bit of a symbol. And I guess, like, the the question that I'm getting to with this is, like, what what's your hot take on gritty?
Oh, I would love to give you my hot take on gritty. So this is gritty is everything about Philadelphia that you love and hate all wrapped into one. It's so perfect. So the thing that I love the most about Gritty so first of all, Gritty as a mascot is terrifying. Like, the stuff of nightmares just just visibly terrifying. And when this mascot got rolled out, everyone in the city of Philadelphia was like, what is this? I can't believe that the city of Philadelphia did this. This is ridiculous. You're embarrassing us. Like, gritty is insane. Gritty is terrible. And so there's this great, you know, kind of tweet that's like, local media local Philadelphia media, Gritty is terrible. National media, Gritty is terrible. Philadelphia, don't you talk about Gritty? He's a national treasure. Don't shoot. And it was so silly. Everything about that moment was just like, that is so silly to, like, talk trash. And then the second that someone else talks trash, you're like, don't talk trash about Philadelphia. So there's, like, this kind of wonderful, like, it's okay if we say it, but not you, sort of, like, familial vibe almost of it, and I just love that. And there's so much of it that just is like, yeah. That just looks like somebody from South Philadelphia in some ways. You're like, there's there's a lot there. So I think the the turnaround on that became quite real for people, and I think, it did make the mascot even more endearing. And I was just like, weird how that works, but, sure, I'll take it. So that's my hot take on Philadelphia of I agree very much with what other people have said in terms of that reaction and makes me just you have to love Philadelphia for that attitude switch.
So now now that we've talked some Twitter and some gritty, I do wanna, like, shift us into, one of our main topic areas for this episode. And, one of the things I I wanted to cover with you in part, and, again, to give, like, listeners some context. I had the the privilege of, to maybe not steal your words, but to, like, fall into a conversation you were having with some folks about the concept of civic tech as a movement and well, isn't a movement and all of that sort of thing. And I guess to start us off with that, like, let's go hot take again. What what's your hot take on that statement? Just like the the word civic tech as a movement.
I think I remember the conversation you're referring to, which goes after many days of a very inspiring conference, but also many, many beers. So I hope I get the, like, sentiment right because I feel like whenever I am, partaking in that, I'm very, like, emotional and sentimental, and we can do this. So hopefully, I can recreate that in in this context. Yeah. I mean, I do think that there is something really incredible about just this time. You know, I think that was so impressive about civic tech is that it really does empower people to operate and influence in a way that they just haven't been able to before, and, also, they've been invited to the conversation in a way they haven't been before. I think that oftentimes when we think about civic engagement, it's either hyperlocal where you can be a block captain or work on a civic association or you're in elected office and you can vote. And and those are kind of the two options. And, you know, not only are those options not great because those institutions are outdated in some ways. Right? Like, some of those principles are good and we wanna keep those, but some of the infrastructure just doesn't make sense for our world today. But, also, the way that people work, I mean, the way that people operate as young professionals, as young people, you know, they're motivated by different things, and I think that they have different aspirations. And if they're able to leverage their network, their skill set, their, you know, their sort of resources, those are all things that we wanna tap into, and yet we're just not updating the infrastructure to do that. And I think civic tech is an opportunity to do that. Right? We're creating this infrastructure for people to plug in in a way that they haven't done before and really be part of the conversation in a way that they haven't before. Also, because they have expertise that people who've been making decisions don't have. So I think that there's definitely a really interesting time that Civic Tech is coming up, and then I also think a really interesting way. You know, I think it attracts people from a lot of different backgrounds. Right? It's not just about people who are coders. Like, there's so many people who come from politics, who come from grassroots organizing, who come from social sciences, from economics, from, research, and so many walks of life. So it's actually, like, in some ways, kind of a a big tent. And so I think that, you know, something that has been really resonating with me from conversations with people at different points in time, just this idea around how do we really point people in the right direction. And and I didn't, you know, don't wanna take credit for being, like, you know, the the main person to think of that, but I think that's right. Like, I agree with that very much that if we can take all the energy that's been sort of, passively sitting and waiting to become, you know, kinetic, I think that that we can have a really huge impact. And so I think that's where that movement piece comes in is. And we can really, if we can really create that focus, then I think that we'll be able to, just really have something really incredible.
So I I would like to take dig into some of what you're saying there in the context of, like, the idea of perhaps, like, what is a movement. I think there's kinda, like, four things that have to that ends up happening over the life cycle of the movement. Like, there's some community that forms up and decides, hey. Like, there's this common problem or common set of goals that we all have as human beings. Then there's a phase where it's like that said community needs to find and figure out resources, which oftentimes is like, how how did the question and I think you were alluding to this a bit in your answer. It's like, how do you find the right people and get them to the right thing, essentially? Then there's the third phase where it's community finds solutions, which, again, I think you were describing quite a bit there as well. It's like, what then we we've identified problems. We found people. What are we gonna do? And then the last stage then, community is then either accepted by an establishment that exists or replaces it or is rejected by it. It. Where would you say we're at as a, I guess, a community in the context of what I was describing?
Yeah. That's that's super interesting. I mean, I think that I mean, the the last part about I I I agree with the establishment piece. Right? Like, we sort of I think movements are are trying to change, structures and the establishment and really make inroads there. And so I think that the reason I think that's interesting is that so in so many cases, civic tech sort of operates outside of the establishment in so many ways. It's kind of, like, almost in response to. Right? It's like, oh, the establishment isn't doing this, so we're going to. So I kind of wonder about that with Civic Tech where they have you know, we have a a community of like minded people to your point. You know, we're starting to at least talk about solutions and start to think about, you know, what could be solutions to change the establishment. But I do think people are operating with it in some cases and outside of it in other cases. Right? So, like, when we think about brigades within the national network, it's, you know, it's like, okay. Well, brigade is gonna go work with a government partner to change the way the govern governing body operates. And governance, I think the difference here, right, other than government structures, Governance is this sort of boring bits, right, where it's like service delivery, administration. And so we are seeing some of that from some parts of the establishment. So, yeah, I guess I'm kind of in a long way saying I am seeing some of that already with brigade collaboration. And then also seeing people not necessarily assuming that they have to work in or with or aside from the establishment and really saying, we're just gonna kinda create our own thing and service what we think makes sense as opposed to saying we have to rely on government. And I think that's actually a really big important question in this space right now is what really is the role of government in some of these topics, and where do public private partnerships make sense? Where do you kind of leave that to either a non profit or civic association or, you know, or in some cases, doesn't make sense to have private entities? So I think that's, like, a really hairy conversation that maybe, you know, isn't in the scope of this podcast. But I do think that, you know, to me, I wish I had a better answer for you, but I feel a little bit like there's different stages of the of people in the movement at any given point. And depending on where they are at, they might be in one of those phases.
So so something I think I I'm hearing from you in that is that perhaps there's, like, some difference in where we're at depending on where you are and maybe depending on, like, what community organized there. So, like, where I'm at, for example, in Chicago, we have a group, Shy Hack Night. And their, like, methodology for approaching this is different maybe than, say, in Philadelphia where you're at or in San Francisco. Like, in fact, I I had Derek, either on the program, and he I so I got, like, the opportunity to hear it from his mouth, and that, like, a lot of their perspective ends up being kind of, like, outside in versus maybe Right. A brigade in the network. Maybe their view is more inside out. Maybe they have a relationship there to use. Am I hearing that correctly from you? And if so, do you have any opinions on on, like, the, I guess, that duopoly of approaches?
Yeah. I think so. I mean, I think that it I think it's healthy. Right? Like, I think that that's one of the complicated parts about something that's at an ecosystem level is that there are lots of different operators focusing on different things, operating in different ways, and yet we have a sort of shared goal or shared purpose, which is to really change the way that our civic infrastructure looks. You know, I think that oftentimes we hear talk about government, but for me, it does a civic infrastructure level, and the infrastructure isn't just public funds. Right? It's it's a lot of different people who who make up that infrastructure. So I think for me, I think that's mostly right. And then I think too, you know, just another point is I think the other piece of how we operate is certainly, within our own community in terms of the civic tech community, your government tech community, or or whatever you wanna kinda label the tent. But I think the other side of that is that this group of people want to work with other communities. Right? People who have lived experience, people who, you know, are service providers and government folks. So I think that that when we talk about communities, it can be, a little bit confusing, but I think also definitely important to think about, you know, when we talk about inside out or outside in, what does that mean, what does that look like, and and who are we really talking about when we talk about community, and and what does that collaboration look like?
Are there those bigger trends that you think should continue versus ones that perhaps you should stop, maybe to use the words of, like, a retro meeting?
Yeah. Another great question. So I think in terms of starting, I think this is happening in some places, but it's it's quite challenging to do. But important is, working more with people who have direct experience or lived experience. I think in terms of software, it's really clear, you know, you you go to users and you get direct feedback from users. You care about building something that the the person who's ultimately going to use it wants or meet the need of theirs in some way, shape, or form. So, you know, we can kind of transpose that same principle in this of a technology to say, yeah. You should talk to people who, you know, you're trying to build a solution for. And that mantra from Lauren Ella McCann of built with, not for, I think is something that we we understand and and we we see it in some ways, but I think living that and practicing that, are going to be it's gonna be a process. It's gonna take us time to really have widespread adoption. So I think continuing to be incredibly thoughtful and intentional about our practices, collaboration, and different modes of collaboration, and understanding that just because we wanna make user journey maps doesn't mean that the the community knows what that means or what that looks like or finds that valuable. So just understanding process and, some of the the work that will need to happen when you want to collaborate with people with lived experience. And I also think, one thing that's come up for me quite a lot over the last few days even and just in general with these conversations is really understanding the pace of change and really understanding what productivity means and and what does it look like. And I think that within technology, because the culture is very fast paced, because we're always sprinting, sprinting, sprinting to get to some kind of finish line, there is oftentimes, an understanding of quality, but I think we oftentimes want to be doing and and having solutions and having results and outputs and KPIs. I think when it comes to community based work, that just doesn't work. Right? You're asking people to have behavior changes. You're asking people to think differently. You're asking people who are the professionals to really understand and absorb the lived experience of folks. And even just within our own practice, like, how do we work together in the community on things? So I'd really just challenge us to to continue to evolve our thinking around productivity because even though something is a conversation and we have a twenty minute conversation, it's like, well, we didn't get any next steps out of that. It's like, yeah. That's okay. Both of our thinking evolved on this. And as we refine that thinking, I think that's gonna lead us to better solutions and and better thinking around these topics generally. And then in terms of stopping, I think that's a really, a a great question and a great way of thinking about that. I think that I'd love to see us stop talking about projects so much for brigades. I feel like oftentimes, it always centers around projects, projects, projects as, like, the only and core deliverable as opposed to saying, well, we want five projects that all of us are going to work on collaboratively and kind of have our own instances and we'll iterate. I think that we oftentimes see projects as a way of concrete expression and creative expression for volunteers since we focus very much on how do we do a project better. While I do think that doing projects better is going to be really important, I think just, understanding that that's not our only value or output and that's just one metric of success, I think could be really helpful for us as a community to reframe how we think about those topics and and how do we think about projects and maybe maybe make them less high stakes all the time.
So something I sense in there is there might even be, like, a little bit of an industry analogy that perhaps applies to both that, like, build with not the adoption, that build with not for comment as well as the, like, the influx of, like, using community organizing skills as opposed to just, like, let's build stuff all the time. And that it's like the adoption of agile. So, like, there's companies that they're like, yeah. We're agile shops. But, like, what that really means is, like, hey, guys. We we have a stand up. Or, hey, folks. We we have a stand up that happens. That's a great analogy. But is there some of that sort of, like, behavior that goes on perhaps with those things as well in our space,
do you think? I think that's a yeah. I think that's a great analogy. I mean, I think that's exactly right. Right? Like, the things that we use in our day to day practice, we wanna bring in and incorporate because we see them being incredibly successful at the workplace. And so we say, yep. Journey map. Yep. We need to do card sorting. Yes. We need to do agile, all that kind of stuff. And that's totally practical and useful in many, many context for sure. What I'd love to see is do more of is really look at people who've done community organizing really well, volunteer management really well, and borrow more from those practices. And I think we're starting to, and I've been really encouraged just to see more conversation around that. But sometimes when we talk about these problems, it feels as if, you know, at the brigade level, at least, when we talk about, the Code for America brigade, it always feels like we're talking about these problems as if it's the first time anyone's ever encountered them because we've just discovered them. And the reality is that, no. Like, these are very well trodden problems. Volunteer management at scale is not totally new. Right? We've seen a lot of different groups who have, seen that and overcome that. And so I think one of the cultural practices of technology is knowledge sharing, and I'd love to see us try to influence some of the other people who solve these problems and say, look. We wanna be knowledge sharers. How can we do that and bake in more community organizing practices, more grassroots organizing, and really see if we can look to that for inspiration, versus I think right now, we're trying to solve community organizing problems with technology approaches rather than kind of using the right tool for the right job. So I think that's a great analogy.
And, of course, like, adjacent to community organizing and perhaps something that just comes up in our work because it's adjacent to it in general is the, like, the world of public policy, which, of course, inevitably is gonna touch politics. I don't think there's really any way to to talk about it without it coming up. So I would be curious on what your your thoughts are on, like, the appropriateness of how we interact with that, in part because I, like, I myself am a little bit of a political animal. It doesn't end up on coming into Civic Tech Chat much, but any anybody who did a Google search should be able to kinda sort that out pretty quickly. So, like, what what what are your thoughts on where those things touch?
I can't believe that you haven't given your listeners your story, your origin story in politics because that is a great origin story, but I I will leave that to you to tell tell people about that at some point. That's a great question. I mean, I think that that the policy question comes up a lot. Right? Because our ability to intersect as people with, government structures is through legislation. Right? Like, that is sort of the mandate. That's sort of the enforcement and accountability. You know, if we go to city council or if we go to, you know, the mayor's office, you know, there's there's really, I think some big influencers in terms of, like, oh, yeah. Well, this is a policy. This is legislation. This is a mandate. I sort of have the same attitude of really I think there's an overreliance on that. I think that's a different world that we used to live in where it's like you need rules. Because if you don't have rules, no one follows it and there's chaos. It's just not like that. And I think that we're seeing more and more of the world shift towards, no. You trust people, you empower people, you get things out of their way, and they're they're intrinsically going to want to improve things. So I think, you know, there's definitely sort of a necessary evil in terms of understanding legislation and how it impacts that. But I think that, I guess my bias and maybe my my pipe dream is that we don't have to be so reliant on things that are giving us rules, and instead we can come together more collaboratively to understand principles that govern us. Obviously, you know, with some some parameters there, but I do I do I think that's my general feeling towards policy. And then I think also personally just the way that, like, the average citizen or resident can interact with policy is, not great. You know? It's like public testimony at a 02:00 in the afternoon meeting on a Thursday. You know? It's it's not really set up for a lot of public participation at the moment.
That is very true. And in fact, there was an old episode. I I think I was talking to some folks from, I think it it's Open Savanna that, like, one of the concepts that came up is that there's, like, the concept of a public meeting that whatever body does in question, like, actually wants you to come to. And then there's the concept of a meeting that's just on the calendar as an open meeting because they have to because it's the law. But they don't really want you to check a box. Yeah. Yep. Is is that something that you've kind of observed and run into
as well? Yeah. I mean, definitely. That's so one thing that we've talked about at Code for Philly, I think one of the things that I wish I did a better job on when I was, in a leadership role was really to, breathe more of the mission into what we do. I think we had a lot of interest from technologists who are like, oh, I wanna work with other technologists. But what we really wanted was to encourage people to be really passionate about the civic component of it. And so we were trying to think about how do we bake this into our programming in a more meaningful way. And I think at the time, Yuri Meyer and I were chatting a bunch, and she was like, you know, there's so many people who go and set up at city hall to show off their work or they engage in other ways. And I really get that concept of, like, go to your user. Right? And I was like, oh, duh. A light bulb. Like, of course. We're we're being ridiculous. We're just kind of expecting people to come to us on our terms. So we had talked a lot about how we sort of do these field trips to go to city council meetings or to just get out into the community more that we wanna serve. And, ultimately, it was really challenging because it would be these these meetings would be in the middle of the day, and something that I just heard quite often from people who are doing this type of work is just this constant barrier. And and like you said, it it's it's doing it because you feel like you have to. You're checking a box as opposed to genuinely caring about getting that feedback and that testimony. Because if you did, you'd you'd find a different way of getting it.
I think that's a pretty good segue, for us to talk a bit more about, Code for Philly as an organization, especially since it's kinda come up in that interaction. Yeah. In that context, is there what one might call, like, the code for Philly model for community organizing that in your view? And if so, how would you describe that?
That's good questions. I think that we're still figuring out what community organizing looks like because we're still really, I think, learning in any ways who this community is. I mean, I think that we've tried different sort of pilots or experiments or programs that have helped to create a sense of cohesion. And I think that we do really good on the tech side. I think what we don't do so well on is that community people I was talking about before of people who are neighbors, people who are residents, people who have lived experience. But I think that that's something that we're definitely trying. So I would say, you know, what the model is today, and and maybe it's not what it should be, but I think what the model is today is that we use weekly events to try to engage a lot of our regular ongoing projects and members. And then we use special hackathons to really help us broaden our reach so that we can partner with government and that we can partner with organizations who have a broader reach than we do into communities that we wouldn't be able to touch. So, oftentimes, when we do the hackathon, you know, it's also a great way to jump start somebody in Portra Philly is just to say, hey. Come to the hackathon. A thon. You're gonna have a weekend to get started on the project. So we've worked with government partners to say, hey. What are the problem statements you'd like to see us address at this this pack a thon? Can we get you involved? Can we have you speak at this pack a thon? But then in the last couple of years, what we've also started doing is branching out to partner with other organizations who are not in tech. So last year, we partnered with a reporting collaborative who, is focused on reentry, and we focused the hackathon all about reentry and reintegration solutions for people who are coming out of the criminal justice system. And that was very interesting and yet huge learning experience. I felt like I got a ton out of that. And so there was that one. And then this year, we actually did something called Quest Tax, and that was one where we were going to the North Philadelphia community, which is a particularly challenged community in Philadelphia. And we really wanted to focus on how do we make community members at the center of this. How do we make community members how do we make us a community centered or community driven community based hackathon? I think that we're continuing to learn, but there was a lot a lot of lessons that we got out of engaging those folks. So I think, you know, that those are a couple of things that we've tried, and really just trying to be thoughtful and intentional about how we go out into p you know, to engage folks. But those are a couple of things that we've tried, but I think that's definitely a model that we're still evolving and and hoping to share and get feedback from from others who are doing similar work.
One of the things you mentioned as an event in that, was the idea of a hack night. And I also saw, kind of perusing the meetup in the website that you also have another type of event called an open house. I'd be curious if you could compare and contrast those things and, like, what their purposes are for us.
Yeah. Totally. So, when I started running half nights in 2015, it became pretty clear that just having one night where everything was happening was hard because people came for different reasons to the event. So some people really wanted to come and just not get some features and hit a milestone and go home for the night. Some people just wanted to socialize. Some people just wanted to see what was QuickRecovery all about and learn more about it and all those other valid reasons to come. But it was hard for us to manage certain parts of that as organizers. It was kind of exhausting to, like, run the whole show as an organizer, and it ultimately wasn't providing great value to our community members. So, what we did was we broke it up. I think this was I think this was maybe either early I think this is early twenty sixteen where we broke it up into a different format. So we we said, okay. We're gonna do hack nights where you're just there to work on your project. That's what this is all about. You're there to either join a team, have in person time to collaborate with somebody who you're working with or whatever it might be. Then we also broke it out into open house nights, and the idea of the open house night was to I think they might be called networking nights, but it's just to be social. It was like, hey. You know, we work really hard. It's great that we work really hard, but maybe we don't have to work all the time. And so just having those social connections, was really important to me that we have some space to give people a chance to get to know who we were as people, to socialize and create those bonds together even more, in a more, intentional way. And then also just to give people a sense of, like, you know, what do you do? And then the the kind of third part of that was like, oh, we're gonna partner with other community member technology groups so that we can bring bridge out. That's not just code. It can be design and data science and analytics and all kinds of stuff that that was, broadening my technology piece. And then other sort of formats that we've introduced now is also code group billing one zero one, which is, like like, now kind of breaking out the the one zero one piece to say, okay. Well, we really just wanna focus on, you know, here's quick refilling, here's our mission, here's how you get started on a project, all that good stuff. So it's just really trying to create different formats and different styles for people, to, you know, accommodate what their preferences are, really give them space to to plug in in a way that sensible phenomenological for them in terms of, building upon itself with their membership of, like, I go to socialization, then I, you know, do this thing, then I join a project. So, yeah, that was the intention to really just provide more value to the community members. And I think it's been successful. It's continued on since 2015. So, it'll be almost four, I guess, three years, in 2019.
And if someone out there in civic tech chat listener land is in the midst of organizing their own group around these, like, civic tech type initiatives. Is is there any advice you would give them starting out as they're just getting up and running?
So much advice. I think number one is talk to all of the brigade leaders who have done this before. So make sure that you get connected to the Code for America network and and just just ask a lot of questions. I've spent a lot of time with potential brigade leaders just talking them through what to expect. I think the other big thing is don't do it alone. Don't try to start a brigade on your own, and don't try to start a brigade and then build a community. You know, you really wanna build a brigade only if you have, you know, a lot of people ask you for it and demanding it because it's a lot of work to not have any help on, and it's a lot of work to not necessarily see impact. So making sure that there's a community there who wants to support it. And I think if you have those ingredients to sell to government, to sell to partners is really easy. It's just about making sure that you, you know, if you really know what you're getting yourself into, don't do it alone. And, yeah, make sure that you're doing it for a group of people versus a single interest.
So, Don, thank you so much for joining us again here on Civic Tech Chat, sharing your thoughts about, your perspectives as a thought leader here in Civic Tech, talking with us about status as movement and all of the things that revolve around that. And one of the things we do here on the program is we try to give the guest the opportunity to leave us with the last word. Essentially, those thoughts that we should leave this episode thinking as we go about the rest of our day. So for you, Dawn, like, what what would those thoughts be?
Yeah. And thank you for having me on. I think this has been a great conversation, a lot of fun. You know, I think just, you know, where this got entire, that that same conversation about, you know, are we a movement? And I think for me, the answer is we can be. I know we talk about it a lot, and I think we want to be. But I think we're still really learning what that is and what that means and what it looks like. And I think my big thing for folks that I really hope that they walk away with is just that, you know, it's a current work and that there's a lot of potential to have meaningful impact. But it is it's not gonna happen overnight, and it won't happen in a year or two years. These are really, really big changes that we're talking about. So, I'd love to just, you know, continue to encourage people to keep with the work to see that small changes amount to big and larger changes later down the line. And really just to, say to like, this community and this group of people doing this work is incredible. I think, you know, the the the people who you bond with and the people who you do this work with, those are gonna be lifelong friendships and relationships. So I think, if nothing else, you'll get to spend a lot of wonderful time with wonderful people, and hopefully have some some good impact that will last much longer at the same time.
Awesome. I think you've given us a lot to think about today, and I know myself. I'll I'll be reflecting on this conversation later, and I imagine a lot of our audience will as well. So again, thank you so much for taking the time to be on Civic Tech Chat.
Thanks, Ryan.
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