LYNN — If you see a pile of rubbish on a street corner, or something equally as unattractive, you can now give your phone a couple of clicks and start the process of fixing the problem.
The application is called SeeClickFix, and it’s an online system used to alert the correct city officials of a non-emergency in the community. Thanks to a group of eighth graders, the City of Lynn has officially launched the system for its citizens.
In spring 2022, Luke Maus’s eighth-grade E-Block social studies class at Thurgood Marshall Middle School was starting its action civics project, and came across the program. He said eighth- and 10th-grade students across the state must complete an active civics project, where they identify an issue within the school district, the school, the community, or the state in general, and come up with a solution.
“What happened was students had constantly identified trash, litter, and just other non-emergency issues as being part of the problem,” Maus said.
Maus said some of his 2022 students had heard of SeeClickFix being used in other towns and cities.
“We ended up researching (SeeClickFix) further and realized that (it) would be a really good way for people in Lynn to notify the city government if there’s any non-emergency problems,” Maus said.
Once the students decided the goal was to bring the system to Lynn, they called on councilor-at-large Brian Field, councilor-at-large Brian LaPierre, Ward 3 councilor Constantino Alinsug, and Mayor Jared Nicholson to come listen to their pitch.
“I’ll be honest, I had no idea what SeeClickFix was until their presentation, and I couldn’t wait to make this idea a reality in our city when I left Marshall that day,” Field wrote in an email.
Maus said Nicholson had asked the class to get in touch with other communities using the system to see how it was working for them. So, the class reached out to Salem and Medford.
Maus said one of the communities said, “it was a great way for the people in the community to know and understand if the problems that they felt like needed to be fixed, whether it’s a pothole on the street, or whether it’s a streetlight that’s out, they knew that the city had seen it.”
SeeClickFix can be downloaded as an app on a person’s phone, or it can be accessed on a browser.
Citizens who notice a non-emergency can take a picture of the issue, add location information, request details and send it through SeeClickFix.
Nicholson said in a press released that users of the system are able to track the issue from the time they sent it in, to the time the city has fixed it.
“My administration is committed to improving communication and effectiveness in the provision of city services,” Nicholson said. “This system is going to be very helpful to residents as they can track the status of their issue through its resolution and we encourage residents to report issues directly to SeeClickFix.”
