Campaign Tech for Local Candidates
What if local candidates had access to presidential campaign analytics and canvassing strategies? That’s the service and selling point for the startup Polis, a political canvassing platform that provides local candidates with algorithmic intelligence for voter outreach. Founded in 2015 by Kendall Tucker, a former Democratic campaign manager, and former Republican campaign staffer and developer Steven Liss, Polis produces optimized walking routes for volunteers while noting voter contact numbers and promised support. Candidates can track their canvassers in real time as they knock on doors and record information on mobile devices. In an email to Government Technology, Tucker said the app adjusts to any location and learns “from each voter interaction to continuously retarget voters.” The startup hopes to break into the political tech market as a low-cost option to campaign consultants, who Tucker said most local candidates can’t afford anyway. In this sense, Polis is envisioned to have a democratizing effect. Seven campaigns have tested the technology so far and all have won their seats, including Boston City Council Member Andrea Campbell and At-Large Council Member Michelle Wu. Though the two co-founders aren’t promising sure wins, the efficiency and price point could be a winning proposition for small or large campaigns. Coming for 2016 are enhancements to the platform that will add more citizen data sets to prioritize voter contacts and additional features for volunteers to generate their own contact lists inside routes.
Cambridge CoUbranizes
The Cambridge, Mass.-based startup CoUrbanize has collaborated on a number of civic engagement partnerships since it was founded in 2013. Now the startup, which specializes in city planning outreach, has announced a sizable partnership in its own backyard. In an email to Government Technology, Co-Founder Karin Brandt said a collaboration with city officials is underway to gather community input using the company’s interactive platform. The takeaway for citizens is a social media-like dashboard with mapped development sites, project updates and a channel to submit feedback to officials and developers. As with CoUrbanize’s other collaborations, the site digests city open data to produce insights throughout a development cycle. According to an article from the Massachusetts real-estate news site Banker & Tradesman, the startup is expected to post 42 projects on the site including more than 3,000 new residential units and the city’s Kendall Square urban renewal plan, a site totaling roughly 1 million square feet. Cambridge is one of the latest jurisdictions to use the service. Its reach has steadily grown with Boston signing up for the service in January, along with a handful of municipalities, mostly on the East Coast. The service’s business model draws its funding from subscriptions from developers and municipalities.
App Computes Philly Housing Data
