New Job::Old Idea

It's true and it's official: I have a new "job". Yes, I do have a life outside Microsoft. Requisite Disclaimer: the ideas and views expressed in this post are mine and mine alone.

A couple of months ago, I applied for a volunteer position on the City of Redmond's Planning Commission. During my vacation last week, the Mayor of Redmond invited me to interview for the position. The interview went well, several personal and professional references were hunted down and questioned mercilessly about my personal character, and Mayor Ives decided to recommend me above all other candidates (ahem, singular: candidate) for the job to the City Council.  At their request, I met with the council this Tuesday evening at their regular meeting to answer some qualifying questions. Let me assure you, it was nothing so brutal as the easiest 15 minutes of my 8 hour interview at Microsoft. Yesterday, I learned that I have been selected for the position on the Planning Commission.  This is my first official foray into public service and I am extremely excited.

I hope this position allows me to push for the implementation of one of my pet science projects: a City of Redmond Police Blog.  Based on a recent experience, I think that something like http://www.fdle.state.fl.us/alerts/xml/rss.asp  could be helpful to the citizenry of my fair city.

The police blog idea came to me after my truck was broken into earlier this year (unfortunately, the would-be theives were unable to start the truck with a screwdriver--a failure which cost me a great deal more time and money than had they been successful in stealing it).  So how might a Police Blog have prevented my truck from being rendered undriveable by a pair of inept burglars? Apparently, there had been a spate of attempted car thefts in my quiet little suburban neighborhood that week. Foreknowledge of this crime spree would certainly have led me to take additional steps to safeguard my vehicle against theft (locking the doors perhaps...).

In my off hours, I have been working [slowly slowly slowly] with some RPD folks to scope out the desirability and feasibility of and a strategy for implementing a police blog with the following characteristics: No public comments, near realtime, quasi-automated, low maintenance, categories (date/report_type/priority/neighborhood), RSS.

I have recruited a small group of fellow Microsoft employees to assist me in this endeavor.  As I've learned though, technology and politics are like water and molassas.

I recently discussed the police blog idea with Redmond's mayor, Rosemarie Ives. She had never heard of weblogs and seemed lukewarm to the idea at first. Apparently, the suggestion that public information be freely available is politically sensitive, as bizarre as that sounds.  She cited the City ofBaltimore as an example of near-realtime police data being posted to the Web and then exploited by criminals.  I countered by reminding the Mayor that it is very likely that radio hobbyists are already streaming Baltimore police scanner feeds to the Internet. I also added that we mustn't post all law enforcement activities to a police blog and that a standard delay of 24 hours for non-critical items would be completely appropriate.  She ceded my points but immediately fell back on the "we don't have enough highly-trained staff to ensure that everything that gets posted is okay, do ya know what I mean?" Argh! Bureaucracy! I argued that an automated or semi-automated system would obviate the need for a fulltime oversight committee.

My wife Jen, sensing that I had not adequately explained the potential and flexibility of the technology, stepped in.  She noted that a blog would be a wonderful way to rapidly disseminate city news and announcements in a neighborhood- or subject-specific way to key constituencies and concerned voters. Wow!