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Health & Fitness

City Council Endorses Vote St Pete

A new tool is being developed to allow all inclusive consensus building to occur for complex issues that affect large groups of people.  (more on that below)

We were invited by Council Member Karl Nurse to present that concept to City Council.  And we offered this new tool to the City of St. Petersburg for free.

After much debate it looked as if the council was going to delay the decision to use our service when Council Member Gerdes saved the day with some sound logic and plea to move forward.  The council voted 5-3 on a resolution to have Mayor Foster consider using our platform to aid in the consensus building of the St. Petersburg Pier.

Our only goal is help the city move forward with the voices of the residents heard.  City Council made a big step today when finally agreeing on a way forward by passing a resolution, however small that step was. 

Most important, it was a step forward.

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Background

Find out what's happening in St. Petewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

I met with Matt Florell and Leonard Schmiege after a recent mayoral primary debate at the Palladium and in short time, we started brainstorming about ideas to help our great city function better.  Specifically we discussed new technology and how it can be applied to bring elements of our government into the 21st century.

This led to developing a new platform, based on years of past work, that focuses on consensus building.  We looked at the pier issue that was soon to be in need of direction and thought we can be of service.

Very quickly, we developed a live demonstration, featured on VoteStPete.org, and used a general question about the future of the pier to test drive our platform.  It showed that a system can be devised that is highly inclusive and very conveniently allows residents to weigh in on complex issues.

That motivated us to push forward and develop an initial process that can be the first step in uniting our residents towards a solid path of a pier we can all call our own.

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