Getting to 80% - Building technology to increase national voter turnout and participation across America

For our next tech talk, we’re excited to welcome Democracy Works!

Democracy Works are a NYC-based team of software developers, public policy wonks, and civic organizers building the tools needed to upgrade the infrastructure of our democracy and improve the voting experience for voters and election officials alike. Their vision is straightforward: make voting a simple, seamless experience for all Americans so that no one misses an election.

To this end, Democracy Works developed TurboVote, a web application built on a microservices architecture that helps you register to vote, request an absentee ballot, and receive election reminders; they work with local election offices throughout the US to collect, clean, and standardize a national polling place dataset (among other things); and they provide an API in front of a detailed calendar of upcoming state, special, and local elections. Recently, TurboVote integrated with AppNexus’ FIA alert hub to serve real-time, geo-targeted election reminders nationally.

This talk will explore Democracy Work’s products and strategic approach, and showcase opportunities to get involved.