Catherine Bracy is Director of Community Organizing for Code For America, a national organziation that builds open source technology and is working to make government services simple, effective, and easy to use. Bracy joins us to talk about civic hacking and an upcoming event, CityCampCHA, where she will be the keynote speaker. Reporter David Morton also joins us for the conversation. Morton is covering the event for Nooga.com.
CityCampCHA will take place January 8th and 9th at the Chattanooga Public Library and is free and open to the public. From their Web site:
CityCampCHA is an unconference focused on innovation for municipal governments and community organizations. As an unconference, content for CityCampCHA is not programmed for a passive audience. Content is created and organized by participants and coordinated by facilitators. Participants are expected to play active roles in sessions. This provides an excellent format for creative, open exchange geared toward action. CityCampCHA recognizes that local governments and community organizations have the most direct influence and impact on our daily lives. This event seeks to create local communities of practice who are dedicated to design, process, and technology applications that make cities and other local communities more open and “user friendly.” The theme for CityCampCHA is Building A Safer City.
In this TED Talk, Bracy explains why good hackers can be good citizens:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeAGu40vZzI