County Calls on Coders, Developers and Designers for ‘Hackathon'

Alameda County is inviting technology professionals to put their skills to the test at its second “hackathon.”

The daylong event will be held this Saturday, April 27, at Berkeley High School with the aim of creating a web or mobile app that will make government more transparent and accessible while addressing community needs. 

Coders, designers, software developers and other tech experts will be tasked with building and designing new apps to benefit education, provide community support, prevent crime and improve civic engagement.

The winning team will take home a prize of $3,000. Second and third place apps will receive $1,500 and $500, respectively.

Qualifying apps must be original, have a positive impact on county residents, be easy to use on multiple platforms and leverage county data. Apps must also be free and open-source.

The last hackathon, held in December at the Castro Valley Library, brought out 120 participants who created 24 apps.

The winning app was BookIt!, which allows users to check out books from the library using their smartphone.

Registration for this Saturday’s hackathon begins at 8:30 a.m. Participants will hear pitches, form teams and begin coding at 11:30 a.m.

County residents are also being asked to share their ideas on the hackathon website at http://code.acgov.org/ideas.htm.

Submitted suggestions include an app to report potholes and street light outages, a map of senior services and a map that highlights all schools within the county.

For more information on the hackathon, visit http://code.acgov.org.