The 2010 Census has begun – you should have already received your questionnaire. And if the 2000 census is any indication only 45% of us New Yorkers have sent it back. In the next few weeks, census workers will begin making house calls to try to gather data from non-responders and to seek out people with no fixed address or live in non-standard housing.

Steven Romalewski – familiar to Omnibus readers from his report on OASIS, the Open Accessible Space Information System, last September – is tackling the issue of undercounted populations with a new website that highlights regions that are likely to be undercounted and thus underrepresented. Hard to Count 2010 helps clarify both the logistical challenges of counting the third largest national population in the world (or about 4.5% of human beings) and shed light on who the winners and losers are under the current census system.

The map can be filtered according to various characteristics that hinder an accurate count, including prevalance of poverty, of rental units, of transient laborers and of language isolation. As his map shows, New York City’s high immigrant pool, high renter rate and high proportion of people depending on public assistance make the city’s count particularly difficult.  Perhaps as a similar measure to encourage participation, the Census Bureau is running its own live-feed interactive map highlighting the highest-response rate regions (Montana has already sent back 33% of its forms! New York’s Lyon’s Falls Village, population 591 (2000 census) already has a response rate of 70%!). What both maps show is that New York City is losing millions of dollars in funding to better counted communities.

Census workers may make up to six visits to individual homes before turning to neighbors to help fill in missing data. Through heavy regional advertising and community outreach, officials hope to fill in the holes of undercounted populations. But the measures are not always enough to combat the issues that arise in highly transient, non-English-speaking, or poorer populations that are hesitant to be counted by the government for a whole host of reasons.

Census information is completely confidential until 72 years after it’s documented, at which point it is released to the general public. As a court recently ruled, the Patriot Act cannot supersede the legal confidentiality of census data. This confidentiality, however, does have a history of being violated, such as the WW-II era use of census data to round up Japanese-Americans for internment in camps. But some question why individual data should be collected at all, and, wary of government control or surveillance, are demanding that the census return to its most literal constitutional interpretation, which directed marshals to count “the number of the inhabitants within their respective districts” with no regard to names or other data. Others are pushing for the use of statistical sampling to help estimate data for hard-to-count populations, an approach that would likely benefit dense urban areas. Census numbers, after all, determine how many seats each state holds in the House of Representatives and impact how and where some federal funding is distributed.

For more information on the census, WNYC’s Brian Lehrer is doing a series on the census called ‘Ten Questions That Count,’ examining a range of topics, including the reasons for its politicization, why New York is particularly susceptible to undercounting, myths regarding population trends and a look back at comedy pieces of censuses past. Last Wednesday’s show featured two Omnibus contributors, Steven Romalewski and Seema Agnani. Check out the podcast of Why New York Is Hard To Count on the WNYC website.

Because, don’t forget – we can’t move forward until we mail it back:

I was intrigued by the post, Letting Off Some Steam, and would like to take a shot at answering the question, “What other infrastructures do you think are ripe for public involvement?”

My observations are based on real use of smart phone, mobile web and web reporting on SeeClickFix – a free web tool that I co-founded – that allows anyone to report non-emergency issues to those responsible for public space, including government agencies, public utilities, property owners. SeeClickFix provides a platform for communities to report and have constructive conversations around the issues that they feel will improve their community.

The basic municipal infrastructure that benefits from increased citizen-reporting includes potholes, littering, streetlight repair, clogged catch basins and dead trees. Deputizing citizens as city inspectors cuts the costs of paid city inspectors as well as the liability for municipalities: more thorough reporting by more eyes on the street. That’s the basics of 311 call centers and one of the ways SeeClickFix is connecting citizens to governments via its free reporting tools.

In addition to identifying infrastructure and public space issues, SeeClickFix enables public reporting related to crimes-in-progress and specific property complaints as well as broader urban planning priorities. Below are some of the other ways SeeClickFix is being used.

Crimes-in-Progress
Police Departments can benefit from increased reporting. On SeeClickFix, prostitution, drug dealing and speeding hotspots are all crime-in-progress types of issues that get reported. The benefit of allowing crowds to report anonymously on things they might not be comfortable putting their face behind has led to increased drug and prostitution arrests. In regards to speeding, the police have picked hotspots based on SeeClickFix reports and have been able to untangle the non-emergency phone line where there is little they can do at the time of incident.  Neighbors can also document crimes like muggings and car break-ins after they are reported to police through traditional means to show how the neighborhood needs greater enforcement. This might lead to neighbors forming a block watch and greater awareness around public safety.

Private Property
In regards to private property, neighbors weigh-in on what type of business they might want in the neighborhood such as grocery store or, in the case of New Haven, an Apple Store. Neighbors might also use the tool to demonstrate a blighted property to officials or to their other neighbors in an attempt to shame them publicly into improving the property. Halted developments that have lost financing during construction show up on the site frequently as well. Making private developers know that the neighborhood is watching while simultaneously alerting officials can be a powerful double punch.

Infrastructure and Transit
In regards to cycling and pedestrian improvements, faded crosswalks, dangerous intersections with no pedestrian lights and poor bike infrastructure all make the map. Citizens have used the tool to lobby for bike lanes and pedestrian in-road signs as well as new crosswalks. In some cases, citizens have offered to help pay for these services.

Utility Companies can use the tool to monitor their sub-contractors road work when replacing in road lines or their equipment such as the infamous AT&T V-Rad boxes which not so gracefully adorn telephone poles all over the country. AT&T monitors their boxes via SeeClickFix in New Haven.

In regards to transportation, we have seen public busing, trains, subways, school busing and private busing companies benefit from reports that range from unsafe operation to necessary infrastructure repairs. Neighbors have slowed University shuttle speeds as well as school bus speeds using video cameras to document speeding at Speed Signs.

Environment and Public Space
In Philadelphia and Prince George, British Columbia, the Clean Air councils have used SeeClickFix to encourage reporting of idling vehicles and have used those reports to force the ceasing of the practice by the companies who operators are violating city ordinance.

Urban and community planners can not only report the need for public and private space improvements but also use public reporting tools to collaborate on design solutions for the public space. On SeeClickFix, we have seen conversations about beautifying highway underpasses as well as design solutions for public land and new and improved streets.

Parks are great places for geo-located smart phone reporting when street addresses are not available for locating an issue. Parks Departments, Parks Groups and caring residents have responded to broken playgrounds, un-mowed grass, broken benches, abandoned garbage and lack of lighting to name a few.

University and other large-scale employers can use crowd reporting to keep tabs on their infrastructure and the physical needs of students and employees.

Elected officials at the State level may benefit the most from a municipal-level reporting system: they can receive alerts on issues for which they may have previously had trouble getting a pulse.

We kept the tool open to reporting of any type of non-emergency issues as we could never predict all the things that would need fixing in your community. These are some of things that have been reported so far. If New Yorkers started reporting, I’

m sure new uses would be found for the tool.

Tools meant to improve governance should embrace participation in solving problems as well as reporting. SeeClickFix is about empowering community and de-institutionalizing governance of the public space.  With that in mind, we made sure that anyone could assume responsibility and receive alerts.

So whom do you think should sign-up to start watching New York?

Here are my thoughts: City Council, 311, neighborhood groups, Con Edison, the water and gas companies, parks groups, block watches, CUNY, NYU, Columbia and other universities, police lieutenants and the concerned citizen. Http://www.seeclickfix.com/government is the URL, but anybody can sign up to help maintain.

SeeClickFix is business conscious as well socially conscious. Here’s our pitch to Con Edison: steam is definitely an emergency problem and any reporting to Con Edison should be endorsed by Con Edison with a promise to monitor the reports. If Con Edison wants mobile web reporting and iPhone and other Smart Phone reporting we can enable customized SeeClickFix reporting within a month and for very little cost to the utility. Contact team@seeclickfix.com if interested.

As with all review and opinion pieces posted on Urban Omnibus, the views expressed are those of the author only and do not reflect the position of Urban Omnibus editorial staff or the Architectural League of New York.

Ben Berkowitz is Co-Founder and CEO of SeeClickFix.com, a free web tool that allows communities to report non-emergency issues to those responsible for the public space. In his volunteer life, he currently serves as President of the Upper State Street Association, a neighborhood and business group which he founded in 2007, in New Haven, CT. He has been a leader in the drive towards local government transparency as well a pusher of greater citizen participation in hyper-local news.