Inspiring a Community Renaissance

An LA civic tech company comes face to face with our country’s local leaders

The Burg
The Burg
Jul 25, 2017 · 6 min read

We touched down in Miami on Friday night on our first business trip, ever.

In spite of the fact that we are a couple of young and totally unproven entrepreneurs, through a campaign of persistence we were selected to pitch at the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

After going through months and months of rejection, we finally got a real shot to prove our case.

We got to the conference at the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach around noon on Saturday. It didn’t take long for a couple of recent college grads, roughly three decades younger than the average attendee, to attract stares. It was clear we didn’t belong from the get go. If it wasn’t for our badges, I’m sure people would have assumed we were interns. However, the staff were wonderful. We placed our badge’s on our shirts and immediately the stares changed from “they don’t belong here” to “who the heck are they?”

The staff led us into the conference room where we would be doing our pitch. It just so happened this was during Bill Clinton’s speech. I asked to double check; there was no way that we were going to be on that stage, the same stage that former President Clinton was currently speaking from. It was true. In a few days we’d be gracing the same stage in front of hundreds of our nation’s political leaders.

No pressure.


How in the world did we get here?

This journey began out of the ashes of failure. In late 2015 we, a group of politically diverse friends, got the idea to create a podcast that attempted to unweave some of the media coverage and general insanity that consumed the primaries during the presidential election. This was way before “Fake News” was a concept we all recognized and argued about. Although the recording sessions were a lot of fun, listening to the content we produced was not.

However, our failed podcast wasn’t totally fruitless. Through our constant challenges, arguments, and research we stumbled upon a few core ideas:

1. People were using social platforms to talk politics, but only national politics.

2. Local issues and local politics are where our vote matters most and where we can impact the most change. In contrast to the prevailing media narrative, American democracy is designed to work from the bottom-up, not top-down.

3. There should be a better way for voters to organize within their community and their city.

We assumed this better way’ already existed in some form and we were simply behind the ball. We couldn’t believe that although a ton of money has poured into civic tech, nothing this simple and important has been created. Software is indeed eating the world, as Naval Ravikant is fond of saying, however it seems to have forgotten entirely about local politics. We still connect with our local reps and learn about local issues in roughly the same way we did 200 years ago.

Apathy isn’t the problem. People do care about their communities. What we need is a better way to engage within the areas we live. We need to inspire a rebirth, a renaissance of sorts that gets people involved again, like the Roman Forum and Greek Parthenon did centuries ago.

We were shocked to find that little to no one was working on this problem. It perturbed us to the point where we decided to address it ourselves.


Our solution is simple: a digital public square.

The Burg is a digital public square where local representatives and local news are streamlined directly to verified constituents. By building a Burg for each district and hosting unique features such as online town halls (think Reddit AMA/Quora Session), we’re giving people a new way to engage with their local government.

It is in our communities and our cities where we can have the largest impact on our day to day lives. The Burg equips citizens with the information and tools to shape the places they live. Our goal is to not only build a platform necessary for the future of cities, but to hopefully inspire a Community Renaissance along the way.


I may look calm, cool, and collected up there but I was exquisitely nervous. Not only was I going up against competitors that were well cemented in the industry, not only was I speaking to hundreds of people (let alone mayors) for the first time, but I was a good deal younger than anyone else.

I had to prove I wasn’t just a kid with a dream, but an adult with a vision.

Some of civic tech’s finest companies competed in the pitch: mySidewalk, Acivilate, BoodsKapper, and CityCop. We were blown away by the great ideas they presented. It was a tremendous event, and we were astounded by the enthusiasm the mayors showed for using technology to improve their cities. We faced stiff competition, but the mayor’s voted and agreed that citizens need a better way to connect with their communities, and that way is via The Burg.

We are happy to announce The Burg took home 1st place!

A great tip when it comes to public speaking: USE YOUR BODY. Walk around. Use your hands. Jump up and down. It doesn’t matter exactly what you do, just be mobile. If you go up on stage and stand still for more than 10 seconds, your feet will turn to cement and you will look like a bobble head as you try to address the whole crowd. Let your body’s movements distract your prefrontal cortex for a bit and just be.

The entire conference was an eye-opening experience. The event was fast paced and filled with influential speakers from Bill Clinton to Frank Luntz to Michael Bloomberg. Clinton emphasized how the opioid crisis impacts us all, Luntz spoke at length about framing local issues and the power mayors have to change people’s everyday lives, and in typical Bloomberg fashion he announced a $200 million American Cities Initiative to equip mayors and citizens with the tools to strengthen our communities.

We were really just happy to be there — to have the chance to attend and pick the brains of local leaders. Nobody knows how local politics works better than local politicians, and we were surrounded by the best of them. The conference was the ideal environment to test our idea on city leaders across the country. It was awesome to not only do all this, but to also have our vision validated by so many people.

The Burg will be coming to Los Angeles by the end of summer (and possibly even more cities after the success of this event).

We can’t wait.

For more, check us out at burg.community.

The Burg

The front page of your city

The Burg

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The Burg

The Burg is the new front page of your city. Download now on iOS and Android! exclusively in LA county (but not for long) 🚀

The Burg

The Burg

The front page of your city

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