The City of Seattle has a new way to report problems in your neighborhood from potholes to graffiti -- it's an app.
People tried it out on Saturday at the first “Find It, Fix It” community walk of 2015 in the University District led by Mayor Ed Murray.
Chris Curtis has walked the streets of the University District for years; she started the farmer’s market there two decades ago.
“The neighborhood has gone through lots of transitions,” said Curtis.
Saturday she had company.
Because Chris knows the U District better than almost anybody, the city of Seattle says people like her are pivotal to “Find It, Fix It.”
Mayor Murray and city police officers walked with her and about 100 others on Saturday afternoon, hoping they would point out what needs to be improved.
“It’s really good to get out and see some infrastructure, some quick changes you can make kind of based on crime prevention,” said Captain David Emerick to the crowd.
This year officials are asking Chris and the others to use an app on their phone to report their findings immediately.
Some people we ran into on the walk say they’ve tried reporting crime in the traditional way by filling out a police report -- but they joined the walk in hopes that using an app would generate a quicker response.
“I finally got a phone call from someone in the police department,” said Pastor Shelly Fayette.
She says it took weeks for that call when someone vandalized a banner at her church, so Saturday she and a friend decided to participate in the walk and try the app.
Chris has high hopes.
“A colleague I work with had a traffic sign down that was in her community in South Seattle. She put the app on her phone; she did what she was supposed to do step by step, and it was fixed the next day -- so to me that’s customer service,” she said.
But we found some skeptics.
One U District business was hopeful Mayor Murray would see a sign they designed asking him to address the aggressive panhandling they say is driving away customers.
“Yeah until a truck pulled up and blocked it,” said Clifton Yates, who works at BC Surf and Sport -- gesturing at the sign on the sidewalk.
They have doubts an app will have much of an impact. Yates says police haven’t.
“We have a non-emergency number they gave us to call -- but they don’t really do anything,” he said.