Introducing the all new Chicago Councilmatic!
Derek Eder
DataMade is proud to introduce the new Chicago Councilmatic! Brand new interface and features, same great legislative taste!
In case you don't remember, Chicago Councilmatic tracks all things related to Chicago City Council:
the legislation introduced and passed
its various committees and the meetings they hold
and the aldermen themselves
Since launching the original website in June 2013 under Open City, Chicago Councilmatic has consistently been one of our most popular projects. That City Council is always up to something, and before Councilmatic existed, getting information about it was pretty hard.
Along the way, we’ve learned quite a lot about Chicago City Council, and have turned that into new features:
Who’s my Alderman, anyway? Many Chicagoans don’t know what Ward they’re in, let alone who their Alderman is. This simple information is essential if you want to engage with City Council, so we made it really easy to find out, either by searching your address or browsing a neato interactive map.
Committees are the key In Chicago, controversial ordinances are rarely voted down on the Council floor. Instead, they are held to languish in committee and die a slow, quiet death. You can now see exactly what that Finance committee has been up to, and see the graveyard of legislation that never saw the light of day.
Public meetings Knowing when City Council meets is important. Knowing when the Zoning Committee is voting on your ordinance is even more important. You can now see every past and upcoming committee and City Council meeting, and the stated agenda for each.
Timeliness City Council meets a about once a month, and when they do, it's a flurry of activity. With the new Councilmatic, we cranked up the updates and refresh our data every day instead of once a week.
Fast access on any device Councilmatic now has a brand-new and lightning-fast interface, and it looks so amazing on your smartphone.
What should we add next?
DataMade is committed to maintaining and improving the new Chicago Councilmatic. There’s still a lot more we plan to do with it, including email alerts, visualizing flows of legislation and measuring Aldermanic performance.
To get updates as we add them, join our email list. If you have any suggestions on features we should add, let us know by emailing in...@datamade.us or filing a new GitHub issue.
Today Chicago, tomorrow the world!
The new Councilmatic is part of a partnership with the Participatory Politics Foundation with support from the Sunlight Foundation. We’ve designed Councilmatic to be easily re-deployable in new cities, by building it on top of the Open Civic Data standard. We’ve already brought it to New York City, and are actively spreading it to other cities! If you're interested in bringing Councilmatic to your city, sent us an email at in...@councilmatic.org!
Until then, go forth and help us keep an eye on what our elected officials are up to!
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Randy Baxley
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