Cincinnati officials will be discussing a new plan Wednesday morning that will use technology to better communicate with residents in the city's 52 neighborhoods.
The city is partnering with Nextdoor.
The website has been operating since October 2011 and has about 16,000 neighborhoods represented nationwide.
Communications Director Kelsey Grady said Nextdoor is a private social network that allows neighbors to connect.
“Whether it’s straightforward things like getting a recommendation for a great babysitter or plumber,” Grady said. “Or more personal things like talking about a lost pet or more critical things like talking about a rash of break-ins in the neighborhood. Neighbors across Cincinnati can use Nextdoor for a variety of things.”
Grady said the city administrators and the departments will be able to do several things.
“So that they can post important information into the different Nextdoor websites that have been created by the residents of Cincinnati in their neighborhoods,” Grady said. “It does not mean that the police department gets access to these private neighborhood websites. It means that they can post content into them and respond to any comments on content that they post.”
A neighborhood site begins in a rather simple way.
“One person does start the Nextdoor website, they are called the founding member,” Grady said. “They invite others to join the site and usually we see the founding member invites 3 or 4 people to join and then they invite 3 or 4 more people to join and pretty soon you have this vibrant online community of neighbors.”
Residents are asked to verify their addresses so they are connected to the right neighborhood site.
City officials said it's another tool to improve safety and community outreach efforts in the city's 52 neighborhoods. So far 36 city neighborhoods have Nextdoor sites.
