Code for America unites techies, government civic service Code for America connects techies with government

Code for America techies Serena Wales (left), Alex Yule (top right) and Mick Thompson (bottom right) at a work station in the 9th Street offices. Code for America in San Francisco, Calif. has been called the "Peace Corp for Geeks." It dispatches techies nationwide to help city governments with their innovative technologies. less Code for America techies Serena Wales (left), Alex Yule (top right) and Mick Thompson (bottom right) at a work station in the 9th Street offices. Code for America in San Francisco, Calif. has been called the ... more Photo: Brant Ward, The Chronicle Photo: Brant Ward, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 5 Caption Close Code for America unites techies, government 1 / 5 Back to Gallery

A little more than a year ago, Prashant Singh was an engineer at Microsoft's Mountain View campus working on projects including Internet-connected televisions and the Xbox.

But for the past year, his career has taken a civil service turn. The 31-year-old engineer spent 2012 designing a public transit tool and other technology for the city of Detroit.

Through the San Francisco nonprofit Code for America, Singh took a sabbatical of sorts. As fellows of the effort nicknamed the "Peace Corps for geeks," Singh and 25 other techies fanned out for a year across the United States to help municipalities develop innovative technology to help them run better.

Before, "it seemed like the most I could do was write a letter to the mayor and the city council," Singh said. "I wanted to push the envelope (and) make things better for regular people."

Founded in 2009, Code for America is part of a larger "Gov 2.0" movement, an effort that takes the energy and expertise of Silicon Valley and channels it toward government.

This year, the White House started the Presidential Innovation Fellows, a similar program focused on the federal government. Meanwhile, some local municipalities, including Oakland, have hosted hackathons designed to bring together volunteer technologists to create tools to improve government services - in a shorter of amount of time and at a significantly lower cost than it has traditionally taken.

Together their efforts have built apps and other tools to help smooth the sometimes bureaucratic process of dealing with the government, as well as to encourage more civic involvement.

Boston project

One Code for America fellow, for instance, developed a map-based app that allows Boston residents to "adopt a fire hydrant": One or more people can take responsibility for digging out a fire hydrant after it snows. Since then, that app has been repurposed by other cities to enlist residents to adopt sewers, park benches and, in Honolulu, even tsunami warning sirens.

Code for America was founded by Jennifer Pahlka, who previously organized the Web 2.0 conference and other tech events. Inspired by service programs such as Teach for America, Pahlka saw an opportunity for tech geeks to make an impact on local services, particularly given the cutbacks and struggles faced by public agencies.

"Sometimes people will do something for a chance to make a difference and not make money," Pahlka said.

The nonprofit is supported through contributions from organizations such as Google and the Omidyar Network. The participating cities and counties, with financial assistance from local businesses and foundations, also have contributed $180,000.

Pay cut

The fellows, most in their late 20s and early 30s, have come from Microsoft, Apple, Google and other tech companies and are a mix of programmers and designers. They take a pay cut, accepting a $35,000 salary. For the incoming class of 2013 fellows, more than 550 people applied for 28 slots. Concurrently, 29 cities and counties applied to be one of the nine municipalities participating in the program next year. Among those chosen were Oakland, San Francisco and San Mateo County.

The fellows form small teams and are assigned to one of the nine participating cities and counties. They spend a month in training, such as taking a course on negotiating to help them navigate potential roadblocks. Then they are embedded in their designated locale, where they learn about the region's needs. They eventually return to San Francisco to work on their project, but travel back and forth throughout the year to gather additional data about their assigned city.

Oakland proposal

Each participating location has an idea for how the fellows can help, though the projects can change once the fellows start. Oakland, for instance, said it hopes its fellows can help streamline the city's procurement process, making it easier for its staff to order supplies such as pens, paper, toilet paper or lawn mowers.

Oakland has also proposed that its fellows develop a system that could help the city manage Freedom of Information Act requests from the media and public, since it can take considerable time and effort for its staff to respond and retrieve the appropriate documents.

San Mateo County said it hopes its fellows will help the county develop a way to enroll more people in its food assistance program. Though the county has made inroads in recent years, more than 57,000 residents qualify but do not benefit from it, according to a report by the California Food Policy Advocates.

"Even though San Mateo is a wealthy ZIP code, there are pockets of need," said Beverly Johnson, director of San Mateo County's Human Services Agency. "While we've made significant gains in participation, we still have a long way to go."

Forming startup

Now that Singh has finished his Code for America fellowship, he and two other fellows, Alicia Rouault and Matt Hampel, plan to carry on their work through a startup, Amplify Labs. Aimed at people and organizations such as urban planners, they are developing technology that helps collect and make use of location-based data more easily.

Besides the fellowship, Code for America is also leading other civic- and tech-oriented efforts, including a startup accelerator in San Francisco and local brigades around the country that marshal geeks and other volunteers to work on their own tech projects in their spare time.

"Getting involved is really important," Pahlka said. "You can't complain (about the government) unless you step up to the plate."