Civic Builders Pitch and Demo Night

On June 17, Civic Tech DC and Learning Journey AI hosted an event called Civic Builders: Pitch & Demo Night. The event was spurred by the growing relationship between AI and civics, and a desire to spotlight some of the tools in this space. But the event was also a time to reflect upon a bigger question we're all facing right now: what does it actually look like when technology strengthens civic engagement?

That night featured short pitches and live demos from a range of projects, followed by open breakout conversations where attendees could connect directly with the builders behind them.

Pitches:

• Max Ghenis: Policy Engine
• Michael Korvyakov and Krish Malik: The Petition Co
• Puneet Kollipara: HIFLD Next
• Aubrey Ottenstein: Hilltop
• Abigail Haddad: AI Engineer
• Alex Saxerud: VoteMate

Field Notes

A few observations from the evening:

> We drew a solid number of Hill staffers, including a good share of interns. Interns bring so much curiosity in their desire to understand how things could work better, before the weight of "how things have always been done" sets in. This room felt less like an audience and more like a gathering of people interested in closing that gap.

> There's a real abundance of possibilities when civic expertise can be paired with AI coding agents. What was interesting was how many of these projects came from a single builder or a small team of about two to three people, because they were able to rely on AI for some of the tasks that would take an entire team. AI is allowing us to be more nimble and work faster.

> Policy Engine and HIFLD Next both work with public data, but one is for modeling policy impact and the other for mapping infrastructure. The Petition Co and VoteMate both help civic participation, but one is organizing petitions and the other is voter information; similar mission, different mechanism. Even tools that look alike on the surface tend to diverge once you ask who they're actually built for and what decision they're trying to help someone make. The overlap isn't redundancy but rather several people independently noticing the same gap and building toward it from different angles.

> Too often at events like this, you sit, listen, and the conversation ends there. We designed breakout groups so attendees could talk to the builders about their work. It is also a reminder that while AI can speed up the work to reach the "solution," the best projects and tools continuously validate and stay in honest conversation with the communities that hold that local trust. Building this feedback loop into the structure of the night was a core feature we want to continue with future events.