From June 13 through June 24,  Omidyar Network and OATV went head-to-head to see which organization could report the most issues in just two weeks---while simultaneously improving their communities. It was an action-packed 2 weeks for both our teams. Issues were reported, problems were acknowledged, concerns were closed and neighborhoods were improved thanks to the hard work of Team Omidyar and Team OATV.

In two weeks, Team OATV reported 22 issues, 6 of which were closed and 10 of which were acknowledged by San Francisco 311. Through reporting issues, commenting on their neighbors concerns, and creating a public watch area in the Bay Area, OATV racked up a whopping total of 880 Civic Points, launching the team to Municipal Avenger status!

Civic Crusader Team Omidyar reported a total of 15 issues, with 10 issues closed and 4 issues acknowledged. The team helped to improve their community while earning an impressive 500 Civic Points during the 2 week challenge. 



The SeeClickFix team would like to give special recognition (aka mad props) to Team Omidyar reporter KLM. Having reported the most issues of any other participant, we're happy to award KLM the title of official SeeClickFix VC Battle Royale MVP. 

Thank you to both teams for your hard work and commitment to your communities. Although the challenge is over, we hope both teams continue SeeClickFixin' issues and improvements around the Bay Area and beyond!

New Haven, Conn. (June 27, 2011) – Southern Connecticut State University and SeeClickFix announce a new partnership to simultaneously empower the campus community and improve the institution’s physical environment. The university will leverage SeeClickFix’s place-based reporting platform to address non-emergency problems reported on campus, ranging from broken windows and glass to damaged sidewalks and graffiti.

“Since our launch a few years ago, we’ve partnered with countless cities, media outlets, and community groups nationwide and overseas,” said Ben Berkowitz, SeeClickFix CEO. “Now, that list has expanded to include academic institutions thanks to SCSU. We look forward to seeing how our online technology helps create offline results.”

With the reporting platform, students, faculty, and staff can report quality-of-life campus concerns through custom service request categories through the online, mobile (iPhone, Android, and Blackberry), and Facebook platforms, and also provide additional information about the problem through the description or image options. Once someone submits an issue, the reporter and those responsible for fixing the problem will receive email notifications. The facilities department can then acknowledge the service request and update the issue page once it’s been resolved.

The partnership allows individuals to not only report campus issues, but also view, comment on, and vote to fix problems submitted by others. They can even create “watch areas” to receive notifications about issues reported on campus, enabling individuals to follow the progress of all service requests.

Robert G. Sheeley, Associate Vice President for Capital Budgeting & Facilities Operations, introduced the idea of partnering SCSU with SeeClickFix. Sheeley believes SeeClickFix will enhance the capabilities and responsiveness of the facilities department through its transparent and accessible platform.

“With this public, user-friendly forum, we can more efficiently address campus concerns and more closely connect with students, faculty, and staff to solve these problems that impact everyone,” he said.

Thomas Struble, Coordinator of Property/Inventory/Stores/Receiving, will administer SeeClickFix on campus.

“It will improve the lines of communication between campus facilities and the people it serves while also creating a safer and more vibrant environment,” he said.

With commuters comprising the majority of SCSU’s student population, interim president Dr. Stanley Battle hopes SeeClickFix will engage both on-campus and off-campus students.

“Our goal is to engage all students, not just the ones living on campus, and encourage them to improve their surroundings,” he said. “SeeClickFix places the power directly in the hands of the campus community.”

The SeeClickFix widget, mobile applications, and Facebook App can be found here.

About SeeClickFix

SeeClickFix allows citizens anywhere in the world to report and monitor non-emergency community issues ranging from potholes and planted trees to garbage and graffiti. Launched in 2008, it empowers citizens, community groups, media organizations, and governments to work together and improve their neighborhoods. Through mobile web, web, iPhone, Android, and Blackberry apps, the SeeClickFix platform is the most widely-distributed citizen reporting tool in the country. The platform is fun and easy to use for citizens while being inexpensive and easily adaptable for governments. For more information on SeeClickFix or to report an issue, visit www.seeclickfix.com.

In the last few months you may have noticed some new team members at SCF. We wanted to give a belated welcome and a huge thank you to Jeff Mooney, Megan Dalton, Emma Richards and Greta Hotop. I'll be following up with individual posts on each of them in the coming weeks but we wanted to start by highlighting the community management and partner development team as a whole as we're truly impressed with their ability to strengthen and grow the SCF neighborhood. We also wanted to offer a big thank you to Amanda Smyth from Fairfield University and Thomas Gaudett from Harvard University who are interning with us this Summer and providing support to the team while learning about working at a rapidly scaling start-up.

The new team has been busy with new media partners, existing media partners, new and old SideClicks on 6 continents and signing on the host of new governments to SCF Plus. Also, as the default frontman for SCF its been really exciting to see that role distributed to Megan who recently did an Ignite presentation at Sparkcamp, Emma who spoke in Barcelona at Barcelona Digital Congress and Jeff who has spoken at City Camp Raleigh and MCitizen in DC. Its a great feeling as a founder to be able to trust that our initial vision is being represented equally passionately through the evangelism of early employees.

As a last note I also wanted to acknowledge the hard work that some of the team members have been putting into improving our own community here in New Haven and surrounding areas. Emma and Greta haven been helping to fix an SCF issue that I raised a few years ago and soon Megan, Tom, Amanda, Kam and I will be assisting as well. Through a tree planting initiative with the Urban Resources Initiative in New Haven the team has and will be planting trees under the Humphrey Street Overpass so that it becomes equally an Underpass. It is important to us that team members at SCF not only talk about fixing communities but also get their hands dirty and do some fixing themselves. Read more about the trees being planted here:

Community Manager Emma Richards and SCF Super User David Streever Fixing up the neighborhood

A huge welcome and thank you to the new team members helping communities around the world help themselves.

Stonington, Conn. (June 23, 2011) – Today, First Selectman Edward Haberek, Jr. announces a new partnership with an online reporting platform that will enable Stonington residents to submit non-emergency problems and request city services. Powered by SeeClickFix, the place-based reporting platform allows residents to document neighborhood concerns and improvements alike, ranging from potholes and graffiti to tree requests and community murals.

“Through this public forum, we’re hoping to simultaneously engage and empower our residents to assist us with improving the community,” Haberek said. “We like the idea of connecting government with the governed, and the governed with each other.”

With the online reporting platform, residents can report quality-of-life concerns through custom service request categories via SeeClickFix.com, Facebook app, or mobile application, and provide additional information about the issue through the description or image options. Once someone submits an issue, the reporter and the town of Stonington will receive email notifications. The local government can then acknowledge the service request, route it to the proper department, and update the issue page once it’s been resolved.

“SeeClickFix is one way that we can improve our communication with the people we serve while also addressing issues in a timely fashion as they arise,” said Joe Bragaw, director of public works. “By allowing the public to email us issues with pictures, we can quickly assess the priority of the issues and by using this program, we can either ask for additional information and/or send out an email telling the person that the issue has been resolved.”

The partnership allows residents to not only report community issues, but also view, comment on, and vote to fix problems submitted by others. Citizens can even create their own “watch areas” to receive notifications about issues reported throughout the town or just in their neighborhood, enabling them to follow the progress of all service requests.

“Since Gutenberg’s printing press, technology has been used to connect citizens with their government. SeeClickFix extends this tradition by enabling citizens to harness the power of the open web,” said Ben Berkowitz, SeeClickFix CEO. “We’re excited to see how Stonington uses our online technology to empower its residents to take care of their offline community.”

The SeeClickFix Stonington website can be found here: http://seeclickfix.com/stonington and residents can download iPhone, Android, and Blackberry apps here: http://www.seeclickfix.com/apps

About SeeClickFix

SeeClickFix allows citizens anywhere in the world to report and monitor non-emergency community issues ranging from potholes and planted trees to garbage and graffiti. Launched in 2008, it empowers citizens, community groups, media organizations, and governments to work together and improve their neighborhoods. Through mobile web, web, iPhone, Android, and Blackberry apps, the SeeClickFix platform is the most widely-distributed citizen reporting tool in the country. The platform is fun and easy to use for citizens while being inexpensive and easily adaptable for governments. Over 40 percent of issues reported on SeeClickFix are ultimately resolved. For more information or to report an issue, visit www.seeclickfix.com.

As you've been improving your surroundings by reporting community issues to SeeClickFix, you may have noticed yourself checking out some changes on our main site! Launched last week, our slick new reporting form makes it simpler than ever for our users to See, Click and Fix problems in their neighborhood. What makes SeeClickFix convinced you'll love our new reporting form? Glad you asked!

It has Beauty AND Brains
New features mean aesthetically pleasing, accurate reporting

Aside from being ridiculously good looking, our new reporting form is pretty darn smart. Know the physical address of your issue? Can you pinpoint your problem on a map? Or perhaps a combination of both will help you locate what you want to report?



What if you're reporting an issue in a park or public place without a defined street address? No sweat! Just uncheck the "Updating map and form automatically" box, drop the pin where your issue is located, and enter an approximate address in the form. Below is an example of how to report an issue in a park. By dropping the pin where my issue is located and entering an approximate street address, I'm ready to move on to step 2!


It Isn't Afraid of Commitment 
Locking in your location ensures you'll commit to the right category

Once you've mapped your issue location, it will be locked in as you proceed to step 2, to ensure that the service categories you can select from are appropriate for your location. However, you can always go back to update your address or map marker (or both!) if need be by clicking "Change" in the top right corner of the map. 


It Gives you Your Space 
Report anonymously, even when you're logged in.



If you're logged in, but wish to report an issue anonymously to SeeClickFix, simply click "Report as Another User" at the bottom of step 2 and enter the display name and email address you wish to use.  Change your mind? That's okay! Hit "Report as Logged in User" to report under your account.


Ready to fall in love with SeeClickFix all over again? Get to know our new reporting form by reporting an issue today! Start a report from your community's issue page, or hit the quick report button (right) to start from any page on our site. Once you're done, be sure to let us know what you think! Share your feedback as a comment here, email it to us, or tweet it @seeclickfix.

With the help of Eric Melchor, the game of Bingo will be getting a SeeClickFix makeover. A Houston native, marketing pro, and superstar SideClick, Melchor recently launched Htown Bingo--a citywide Bingo tournament designed to empower citizens to take care of their community using SeeClickFix.

Having recently become a first-time homeowner in Houston, Melchor found himself wanting to become involved in his community, Midtown Houston. After reading about SeeClickFix in FastCompany,  Melchor thought the online tool could help him and his fellow residents become engaged in their communities:

I read how other cities were using the tool to fix potholes, recommend bike paths / racks, recommend community gardens, help reduce crime, remove graffiti, etc. The thing that really fascinated me was how residents could see other issues that were reported by their neighbors and they themselves could vote to fix these issues and comment on them as well. Much more effective than using 311 - since multiple voices are being heard and the issues could be tracked as well.

This is where Htown Bingo comes into play. Melchor hopes this fun and competitive game will not only raise awareness about issues in his environment, but also increase SeeClickFix activity in Houston--active citizenship with a competitive twist!

To participate, download the Htown Bingo board, and get ready to see, click, and fix issues in Harris County. The rules are simple:

Look at the revealed squares on the bingo board. When you find something around Houston that matches one of the squares (like graffiti or a pothole), take a picture of it and upload the information to SeeClickFix.com. You can use either the mobile app or SeeClickFix.com to make the report. After you’ve reported your finding to SeeClickFix, tweet the information and picture using the hashtags #htownbingo and #houston – or post it directly to Htown Bingo’s Facebook wall. Mark off that square off your Bingo board.

Every two to three weeks, new squares will be revealed by someone in the Houston community including bloggers, media outlets, and community centers. MommaFindings recently revealed the first Bingo square clue: Cleanup Day. You can get clues about the upcoming bingo squares on the site's 'Hint' section. Melchor believes this twist distinguishes Htown Bingo from the traditional game:

I'm realistic in the sense knowing that I won't be able to get all Houston residents using SCF over night, thus I created a game that will span out over the course of about a year.

Instead of yelling "Bingo," participants will be using social media channels to announce their win. After you've marked off five squares in a row, tweet the famous catchphrase using the hashtag #htownbingo OR post your win to Htown Bingo’s Facebook wall. The first ten people who get Bingo will receive prizes ranging from a Snuggie to $25 Amazon gift card.

The SeeClickFix team would like to thank Eric for not only spreading the SeeClickFix word, but also for demonstrating how one person can make a difference in his community. We look forward to seeing how the competition pans out, and hope you'll follow the action on Eric's blog, @HtownBingo, or Facebook!

Back in April, we told you about the Newbold Neighbors Association's SeeClickFix contest. Well, the contest recently ended and the results are in. Drumroll, please!

With a total of 31 submissions, Mr. T (willey) takes home the 'Squeakiest Wheel award' with reports submitted about issues ranging from graffiti to overgrown lots. With 10 entries, Sammy Pants takes home the 'Captain Random award.' Both individuals will receive their delicious and aromatic awards at the the organization's next meeting. Congrats to both SeeClickFixers and a huge thanks to everyone that participated!

While the contest may have ended, that doesn't mean that Newbold residents should stop submitting reports. In fact, this should encourage fellow neighbors to step up their game and continue reporting issues and improvements here!