Mayors judge civic tech pitches at SXSW
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Good Call, whose 24/7 hotline provides immediate access to legal support for arrested individuals, took home a $10,000 prize and a chance to pitch at the U.S. Conference of Mayors’ annual meeting.
At the annual South by Southwest festival, entrepreneurs and innovators had a chance to pitch city leaders on ideas that address common civic challenges.
The winner of this year’s Mayor’s Matchup Civic Tech Pitch Competition was Good Call, a 24/7 hotline that offers immediate access to legal support for arrested individuals and advocates for legal intervention.
“Good Call blew us away and offered exactly the kind of creative solutions that mayors are hungry for today,” said U.S. Council of Mayors President, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez. “Cities are innovating and investing in new solutions to generational problems and constantly emerging ones. We must be nimble and adapt and every participant showed us the powerful potential that comes from cities collaborating with dynamic private sector partners.”
The competition’s other judges were Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego and Louisville, Ky., Mayor Greg Fischer.
Good Call was awarded a $10,000 prize and will pitch its technology to hundreds of mayors at the their annual meeting later this year in Reno, Nev.
Five other companies pitched their ideas to the mayors:
- Samaritan links individuals to the social and financial capital they need to meet housing and health goals through an app that facilitates donations and encouragement from teams of volunteers and professionals.
- State of Place helps cities use data and predictive analytics to implement the most cost-efficient ways of making places more walkable, livable, equitable and sustainable -- and calculate the value and ROI of doing so.
- Cortico’s Local Voices Network uses machine learning to distill key themes from recorded conversations to fuel engagement, public processes and community decision-making.
- JustAir designs, deploys and manages a neighborhood-level air quality network that delivers actionable insights and curated data reports.
- JusticeText strengthens the ability of public defenders to analyze crucial data with evidence management software that generates automated transcripts of body camera footage, interrogation videos, jail calls and more.
Nearly 20 mayors participated in the Civic I/O Mayors’ Summit, which also featured discussions on how local leaders can use emerging technologies to tackle cities’ biggest challenges.