Cover Image for Civic Hack DC 2025 โ€“ Part 1: Making Public Comments Count
Cover Image for Civic Hack DC 2025 โ€“ Part 1: Making Public Comments Count
Avatar for Civic Tech DC
Presented by
Civic Tech DC
Civic Tech DC brings together volunteers putting technology to work in service of civic and social issues in the Washington, DC community.
135 Went

Civic Hack DC 2025 โ€“ Part 1: Making Public Comments Count

Registration
Past Event
Welcome! To join the event, please register below.
About Event

โ€‹Build open-source tools to unlock federal regulatory comment data with AI, data science, and policy expertise.

โ€‹๐Ÿ“… Saturday, July 26
๐Ÿ•™ 10:00 AM โ€“ 6:30 PM
๐Ÿ“ Taoti Creative in Eastern Market
๐Ÿฅ Food, drinks, and starter kits provided.

โ€‹Please reach out to hack2025@civictechdc.org if you are interested in sponsoring!

โ€‹Sponsored by:

โ€‹Careset

โ€‹Taoti Creative

โ€‹Prefect

TealWolf Consulting

โ€‹
Prizes donated by:
Thunder Compute

โ€‹
More info on our Website

โ€‹Join Civic Tech DC and partners for Civic Hack DC 2025:

โ€‹A collaborative, hands-on hackathon dedicated to using AI, data science, and data engineering techniques to unlock public-comment data and illuminate how the public influences federal policies.

โ€‹๐ŸŒŸ Event Updates:

โ€‹Weโ€™ve been blown away by the interest in this space; from nonprofits, policy experts, and technologists alike. Itโ€™s clear that making public comment data more accessible is a challenge that resonates widely.

โ€‹As weโ€™ve explored the data and spoken with partners, itโ€™s also become clear: one hackathon isnโ€™t enough. Thatโ€™s why weโ€™re kicking things off on July 26 with Part 1 of what will now be a two-part event series. Weโ€™ll follow up with Part 2 in the fall, building on the work we start here.

โ€‹๐Ÿš€ About the Event

โ€‹Join us for a hands-on, collaborative hackathon focused on improving public access to regulatory comment data from Regulations.gov. You'll team up with technologists and policy experts to build open-source tools that make this data easier to analyze, explore, and reuse.

โ€‹No prior experience with federal data requiredโ€”just experience working around datasets and a laptop.

Full List of Event Partners

โ€‹๐Ÿง  Why It Matters

โ€‹Every year, thousands of public comments are submitted in response to proposed federal rulesโ€”but they're locked away in PDFs, spreadsheets, and inconsistent formats. Our goal is to fix that.

โ€‹You'll work with a 2.3TB+ dataset made accessible by Professor Ben Colemanโ€™s team at Moravian, updated every 4 hours and hosted on AWS. This is a rare opportunity to apply your skills to a real civic data infrastructure challenge.

โ€‹๐Ÿ” What Weโ€™ll Build Together

โ€‹This non-competitive event will focus on building reusable tools and answering key questions like:

  • โ€‹Who's commenting? (Individuals, nonprofits, corporations)

  • โ€‹What are the major themes or sentiments?

  • โ€‹Are there coordinated efforts or mass submissions?

  • โ€‹Which comments shaped final policy outcomes?

โ€‹๐Ÿ™‹โ€โ™€๏ธ Who Should Attend

  • โ€‹Technologists: Data engineers, data scientists, AI/ML developers, and coders of moderate skill or experience.

  • โ€‹Policy Experts: Government, nonprofit, or academic professionals who understand the rulemaking process

  • โ€‹Curious Collaborators: Students, newcomers, and anyone excited to learn

โ€‹๐Ÿ“ฌ Submit a Problem Statement

โ€‹We're actively seeking problem statements from policy experts to explore during the hackathon. If you have an idea, please submit it through this form (due July 23); we'll review submissions and select key problems for participants to tackle.

โ€‹One confirmed track: analysis of the recent recent CMS RFI concerning patient-centered health technology.

โ€‹What we'll build together:

โ€‹In this collaborative, non-competitive event, participants will develop open-source tools designed for reuse with any public comment dataset, past or future, exploring questions such as:

  • โ€‹Who's commenting? (Individuals, nonprofits, corporations)

  • โ€‹What are the major themes, sentiments, and sector-specific concerns?

  • โ€‹Can we detect copy-paste campaigns or coordinated submissions?

  • โ€‹What are organizations' historical commenting trends and motivations?

  • โ€‹Which public comments directly influenced the final regulatory outcomes?

โ€‹๐Ÿ“† Schedule (Subject to Change)

  • โ€‹9:30 AM โ€“ Registration & Breakfast

  • โ€‹10:00 AM โ€“ Welcome + Data Tour w/ Prof. Coleman

  • โ€‹10:30 AM โ€“ Problem Overview & Team Formation

  • โ€‹11:00 AM โ€“ Hacking Begins

  • โ€‹1:00 PM โ€“ Lunch

  • โ€‹5:45 PM โ€“ Final Presentations

  • โ€‹6:30 PM โ€“ Wrap-up & Networking

โ€‹๐Ÿงฉ Want to Support the Event?

โ€‹Weโ€™re seeking:

  • โ€‹Partnerships: Organizations interested in co-hosting, promoting, and helping us facilitate the event.

  • โ€‹Subject Matter Experts: Individuals with expertise willing to serve on our problem review board and provide insights on submitted problem statements.

  • โ€‹Sponsorships: Financial support, food and beverage provision, or computing infrastructure; including cloud credits, AI resources, and infrastructure support.

    Please reach out to hack2025@civictechdc.org

โ€‹No prior experience is required! just bring your curiosity, ideas, and laptop. We'll provide starter kits, roaming mentors, food, and drinks.

โ€‹Attendee emails will be shared with CareSet for recruiting efforts. If you would like to opt out, please let an event organizer know.

โ€‹Event image: "Librarian at Lektriever in Washingtoniana Division", from the DC Public Library Archive

Location
Taoti Creative
507 8th St SE, Washington, DC 20003, USA
Avatar for Civic Tech DC
Presented by
Civic Tech DC
Civic Tech DC brings together volunteers putting technology to work in service of civic and social issues in the Washington, DC community.
135 Went