We are thrilled to unveil the first screenshots of Citizinvestor, set to launch in just a few weeks! Take a look below and let us know what you think!
Note: the projects displayed above are for demonstration purposes only.
If you haven’t seen it already, be sure to watch Brooklyn resident Dean Peterson’s video of numerous New Yorkers tripping on the stairs at the 36th Street subway station:
While the video is humorous, it also highlights a very real and practical problem. This is a problem that hundreds of New Yorkers face every day and it is likely a fairly inexpensive one for New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) to fix.
According to a report by NBC New York this morning, “[MTA] crews went to the station Wednesday to block off the staircase in preparation for repairs. It’s not clear what the fix will entail, or how long it will take.”
The public pressure created by the virality of the above video (461,000 views in the first 22 hours) will likely force MTA to fix the problem immediately. But for anyone who lives in or has visited New York knows, this isn’t the only subway station that is in desperate need of minor repairs that will make a huge difference. It is likely that there are numerous small subway projects like this that New York City’s government and MTA have scored and approved, but simply don’t have the money for.
That’s where Citizinvestor comes in. This video highlights a great example of a project that will be perfect to fund on our platform when we launch next month. The project is a small dollar one (likely 4 or 5 figures) that obviously affects numerous citizens in the neighborhood surrounding the 36th Street subway station. There’s no question in our minds that the citizens that trip over the stairs every morning would gladly pitch in $20-$30 to get this problem fixed for good.
A note to the MTA: if you don’t have the budget to fix the stair, give us a shout at info@citizinvestor.com and we will put the project up on Citizinvestor.com where citizens can fund the project in full.
As we get closer to launching Citizinvestor in two very exciting pilot cities (stay tuned to hear who they are), we are actively listening to what the Twitterverse has to say about crowdfunding for local government and civic projects. Over the past couple of weeks, we have seen some rather humorous proposals tweeted, but none compare to this one:
You know, with everyone starting a Kickstarter, how soon will it be before the government does one to try and fix the national debt?
— Jonathan Long (@Weezul) June 19, 2012
We realize it’s audacious, but we have many reasons to believe that citizens will step-up to the plate and crowdfund the local government projects they care about most. But the national debt? Probably not. This humorous exaggeration of what crowdfunding for government projects might look like gives us the perfect opportunity to explain to the world the types of projects we are focusing on funding with Citizinvestor.
In the past 4 weeks, we have had the opportunity to meet with 8 of the 25 most populated cities in America to discuss the types of projects they will be posting to Citizinvestor when we launch. The projects we and our city partners are focused on can best be described as “micro-projects” - four or five figure projects that are one-time capital expenditures. These are projects like parklets, bike racks and LED street lights, not indefinite funding for a soup kitchen, building a bridge or ending the national debt.
This is not to say that Citizinvestor will not be used to crowdfund a bridge at some point down the road (pun intended), but as we launch a new brand in our pilot cities, we will be narrowly focused on funding micro-projects that we believe will have a tremendous chance of success.
Our entire business model hinges on this question: Will citizens financially invest in local government projects? The truth is, we don’t know the answer; but that’s ok, because neither does anyone else as no one has attempted to do what we are doing with Citizinvestor.
We believe that citizens will indeed financially invest in the local government projects they care most about. Here are three reasons why:
But enough about what we think, we want to hear from you! Do you agree or disagree with our premise that, if given the opportunity, citizens will financially invest in the local government projects they care about most?
A few weeks ago, we introduced you to an interesting crowdfunding project in the Netherlands to build a bridge. Today, we would like to introduce you to another crowdfunding initiative from across the pond - this time, a giant floating replica of the Queen of England’s head.
Yes, you read that right. This odd and interesting project was successfully crowdfunded on Spacehive.com - a “funding platform for neighbourhood improvement projects” in the UK.
We are big fans of what Spacehive is doing. In fact, it’s very similar to what we are building here in the US with Citizinvestor. However, there is one fundamental and significant difference between Spacehive’s model and what we are building with Citizinvestor.
We believe that having citizens crowdfund civic projects will work best when projects have already been scored and approved by a government entity. We believe the best approach is to ensure that there is government buy-in for a project before citizens invest, that way they can be confident that if the project meets its funding goal, it will be built.
That said, we also believe that there must be a place for citizens to come to organize projects that municipalities either haven’t approved or haven’t thought of yet. Citizinvestor will give citizens the ability to propose the projects they want with petitions that, once reaching a certain number of signatures, we will help usher through the proper government channels.
Using crowdfunding to fund civic projects is a new and innovative idea. We are not saying there’s a right or wrong way to do it, but this is our way. We would love to hear what you think!
Last night, we submitted our application for Code for America’s Accelerator program. We love CfA and have long been inspired by the work they do to disrupt government through technology.
Not familiar with Code for America or the Accelerator program? Here’s a brief description from http://codeforamerica.org/accelerator:
The CfA Accelerator is an early stage seed startup accelerator focused on the civic space – that is, government, community, and the interaction between the two. Increasingly the way in which we engage with government is channeled through technology, which means there’s a tremendous opportunity for entrepreneurs to build new, successful, and profitable startups that make the experience more like the consumer web. The CfA Accelerator aims to help early-stage civic startups get the financial, strategic, and operational support they need to succeed.
We believe that Citizinvestor is the perfect fit for the CfA Accelerator, and when asked why we thought so on our application, here was our response:
Citizinvestor has the potential to dramatically disrupt the process by which civic projects get prioritized and funded by municipalities. It’s a way of raising government revenue without raising taxes.
It’s a way for citizens to get the projects they want built faster without the government having to find new money in the budget. It’s a way for citizens to communicate and engage with local government without having to attend meetings or public forums.
Billions of dollars in municipalities’ annual budgets are tied to projects that are perfect for our platform. By making these projects public and giving citizens the opportunity to crowdfund the ones they care about most, we will make government more transparent and accountable to the wants and needs of its citizens.
The idea of Citizinvestor has been met with enormous initial success from municipalities. Everyone we talk to in government loves the idea and is eager to put projects on our platform. But we need what CfA has got.
Citizinvestor is ideal for the CfA Accelerator because we are such a young company, and while we have seen initial success in the meetings we have been able to get, we would benefit greatly from the access and awareness the blessing of Code for America would bring. We believe that a milestone as big as being selected for the CfA Accelerator this early in our history will prove monumental to our success and our ability to disrupt the interaction between government and citizens with regards to civic projects.
What do you think? Think we have a shot?
Wish us luck as we await to hear CfA’s decision in early June! And in the meantime, be sure to check-out the impressive program and some of the other things CfA is doing.
As we move rapidly towards launching Citizinvestor.com to the world next month, we wanted to take a moment to share with you what you can expect to see from the platform. We are building a new way to fund local government projects that is better for citizens and governments alike.
Here’s how it works.
Local governments submit pre-approved projects to Citizinvestor.com. These are projects that have already been scored, department-approved and only lack one thing - funding. Projects can be as big as building a bridge or a new park or as small as installing speed bumps or adding a few parking spaces to your neighborhood library. The list of these projects for any city is nearly endless. Currently, these projects sit on a long-list behind other budget priorities, especially now when local government budgets are tighter than ever before.
Citizens invest in the projects they care about most. For the first time ever, we are giving citizens the opportunity to tell government exactly where they want their dollars spent. Citizens can find projects that their local government has posted on citizinvestor.com and pledge to invest any amount they wish towards the project. Not only can citizens invest in pre-approved projects from their local governments, but Citizinvestor also gives citizens the opportunity to propose new projects that local government either hasn’t thought of or hasn’t approved.
Once a project is 100% funded, the project is built! This is key - citizens only pay their portion of the project if other citizens step up to the plate and commit to fund 100% of the stated cost. This is a win/win for everyone! Citizens only have to invest money if there is a guarantee that the project of their choice will be built and governments only have to commit to building a project if they receive 100% of the funding they need. Not a dime changes hands unless everyone is happy. This ensures that there is no risk to citizens for pledging to invest and no risk to governments posting projects to Citizinvestor.com.
We can’t wait to show you what we’ve been working on when we launch Citizinvestor next month! In the meantime, if you know of a project in your city that you would like to see on Citizinvestor, drop us a line at info@citizinvestor.com and we will do our best to work with your city to get the project onboard.
Atlantic Cities (a great resource for those involved in urban revitalization) has recently explored the rebuilding of Cities across the United States. In the latest piece, author David Lepeska looks at how local community activists and Mayors are using innovative techniques to tackle large-scale problems. Ester Fuchs, director of Columbia University’s Urban and Social Policy program, has noticed the same trend saying that, “Cities that are experiencing turnaround have mayors and city councils that have essentially pushed the envelop and grabbed the authority to deal with their problems.”
Nik Theodore, director of the Center for Urban Economic Development at the University of Illinois-Chicago, adds, “Communities are finding a way to rebuild, we’re seeing in U.S. cities a move to try to open up planning and decision-making and come up with new ideas.”
The key here is the buy-in from the community that leads to new solutions and a greater sense of togetherness.
“It’s similar to business incubators, with groups working together, pooling resources to grow and create,” says Fuchs, author of Mayors and Money: Fiscal Policy in New York and Chicago. “It’s essentially building these places up from the bottom so they are once again viable from the view of city government. They don’t just energize, they become the engine that leads to better city governance.”
Fuchs sees a limitation and argues that, “Crowd-sourcing can’t build bridges. This idea that you can bring in a nonprofit and build an efficient solution and then magically bring that to scale, that’s a pipe dream. We need the people to shake things up, but nothing can really be brought to scale without government.”
Let me reiterate that last sentence again: “nothing can really be brought to scale without government.” We couldn’t agree with Fuchs more. Nothing in the public works space (parks, pools, speed bumps, skate parks, trails etc.) can be brought to life without buy-in from government. But how do you couple this reality with the creativity of citizens and their willingness to invest in projects they truly care about?
This is exactly the problem that Citizinvestor is solving. By bringing these government projects to the table and posting them on a platform where citizens can financially invest in the projects they care about most, we believe citizens crowdsourcing CAN and will build bridges.
In the Netherlands, citizens are banding together to build a bridge that will allow pedestrians to travel safely over a series of highways and connect two parts of the city that have been separated for years. And they are using crowdfunding to do it.
Citizens of Rotterdam have been given a platform to buy wooden planks that will make up the completed promenade. As of the time of this post, more than 1,000 citizens have invested in the project, well on their way to hitting their goal.
This is a great example of crowdfunding being used to allow citizens to invest in the projects they care about most - in this case, a promenade. As we inch closer to launching Citizinvestor to the world, we are encouraged by the success these concepts are seeing in communities overseas. We can’t wait to bring this opportunity for crowdfunding projects like this to the States!
There are an unlimited number of local government projects that are not completed because of a single problem - lack of funding.
These are projects like building parks, maintaining pools and improving roads that citizens want to invest in and governments want to take on but can’t, due to a lack of available funds.
For decades, we have seen citizens solve problems like this on a small scale. Neighborhood barbecue fundraisers to save a park or that neighbor who goes door-to-door to fund a project she’s really passionate about are great examples of citizens stepping up to invest in local projects - projects that can only happen through local government and citizens partnering together. But what do these barbecues and door-to-door pitches look like in the 21st century and what does it look like when every project has an equal chance of being funded?
The answer is Citizinvestor. Citizinvestor allows citizens to invest in the local government projects they care about most. Here’s how it works.
Local governments submit pre-approved projects to citizinvestor.com (launching soon). The cost of the project has already been set and department approved, the only thing lacking is the funding. Citizens then find the projects they care about most and invest financially in those projects. Once a project is 100% pledged, the project is built! Citizens don’t pay a dime unless the project is funded in full. This ensures that there’s minimal risk to the local government entity and minimal risk to the citizen.
Not only can citizens invest in pre-approved projects from their local governments, but Citizinvestor also gives citizens the opportunity to petition for projects that local government either hasn’t thought of or hasn’t approved.
This collaboration will revolutionize the way local government projects are funded. We hope you will join us in this venture!
