‘We must build a more responsive city’: Wilmington Councilman Darius Brown

Darius Brown isn’t shy. That’s not unusual for a politician. But what’s telling is the title he is least shy about claiming.

He wants to be Wilmington’s “Tech Councilman,” a self-anointed title he’s making a case for. To an audience of 70 technologists at last week’s Delaware Innovation Week Dev Talks, Brown highlighted the open government initiatives for Wilmington city that he’s been a part of. With a genuine smile and enthusiasm, he waved his hands and talked about three initiatives that were listed on a slide presentation adorned with his own headshot.
“We must build a more responsive city,” said the Eastside resident.
Those initiatives were the following:

• Report It, Resolve It — It is a kind of simpler 311 app, though for now it is focused only on complaints going to the Department of Public Works.
• ShotSpotter — The technology that pinpoints the location of gunshots to help police respond has been credited with helping to increase response rates.
• Tweet My Jobs — This simple tool that puts available jobs in Wilmington onto Twitter to make more applicants aware of opportunities took two years to implement, said Brown, because of of a lack of innovation among some in city government.

A culture of greater transparency with the help of open data must come next, said Brown, but that’s being led by others, like Wilmington city Office of Economic Development Director Jeff Flynn.
“We all have to contribute,” Brown, 34, said. If he wants to be Wilmington’s Tech Councilman, like the city’s tech community itself, he’ll have much more work to do.
See his slides below.
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