Two Civic Demos: 311 Labs and CPS School Locator

For our next meeting, we're getting check-ins on two major projects. Both involve collaboration between government technology people and civic developers, and both are leading to great, reusable code we can all build on.

Jesse Bounds, one of the Code for America Chicago fellows (http://www.smartchicagocollaborative.org/smart-chicago-sponsors-the-city-of-chicagos-2012-code-for-america-project/), will bring us up to speed on what the team is working on now— a Daily Brief app (http://dailybrief.311labs.org/boston) and a national 311 labs website (http://311labs.org/) to facilitate collaboration around 311 apps— and what they have planned next— beta testing the city's new open311 api, and releasing their 311 dashboard and service request tracker (http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2012/06/22/rahms-latest-plan-for-city-accountability-apps-with-tracking/) apps Jay Van Patten, Director of Web Services for the Chicago Public Schools, will demo their new (http://schoollocator.cps.k12.il.us/) school locator website (http://schoollocator.cps.k12.il.us/) and chat about why and how it was built. They're building it all in-house using Google Maps, Google Fusion Tables, and open-source code written by members Chicago's open gov community (http://derekeder.com/searchable_map_template/). Note that this is a new location for OpenGovChicago meetups. We are in the same basic location— Illinois Center— but the Chicago Community Trust has moved one building to the south, 225 North Michigan, on the 22nd floor. Security is far tighter in this building than the previous one, so bring identification and please come early. Seriously— 15 minutes early would be a good thing. Foodz will be served, so come hungry.