Last year, I wrote about a civic hacking event that took place in Philadelphia at the office of Azavea.

The event last year was organized by the team of Code for America fellows working for the year in Philadelphia. Exactly one year to the day later, the latest group of fellows working in Philadelphia held another civic hackathon – also at the offices of Azavea, in the city’s Callowhill neighborhood.

I described my observations at last year’s event this way:

“What I was most impressed with was the ability of this event to highlight to those that were there what is truly possible when government data is open to and usable by developers. It provided an object lesson for all those there in the true potential of civic hacking…

Having the Code for America fellows in Philadelphia, and having them essentially kick start civic coding using city data, has accelerated the awareness of what is possible. I think people would have achieved the awareness that was realized yesterday eventually, but the CfA fellows got people there sooner.

I call it “the CfA Effect.” It was pretty cool to see first hand.”

The event this past Saturday provided a good opportunity to gauge the changes that have occurred in Philadelphia since the city embraced open data with gusto under Mayor Michael Nutter, and welcomed it’s first class of Code for America fellows.

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