Purchia Communications LLC

03/06/2017

Was feeling inspired this weekend and wrote a piece on The Huffington Post that just posted.

It’s Monday morning. The Muslim travel ban is three days old. Stories of refugees coerced into signing away their green cards, children separated from pa...

03/01/2017

City of Boston is making big moves to improve civic engagement and better use data to improve city services. StateScoop has the scoop of course ...

"OpenGov Inc CEO Zac Bookman said the platform will allow elected officials and residents "'to more effectively understand key trends, make informed decisions, and build trust that is essential to the city’s health and wellness.'"

Read more: http://statescoop.com/analyze-boston-cranks-up-civic-engagement-on-open-data

Go Sox!

As part of a broader initiative to encourage use of the city's open data and improve civic engagement opportunities, the city releases a new beta portal for public information.

02/28/2017

"The first case to raise funds on CrowdJustice in the US was the powerful case of Tareq and Ahmed Aziz, two brothers from Yemen who were stopped from entering the US from Yemen, on lawful green cards to which they are entitled by their father, a US citizen. They were then forced to return back to Africa two hours after the executive order was signed.

Six days later after raising more than $36,000 in legal fees, the two brothers were allowed to return to the US to their father."

https://www.forbes.com/sites/montymunford/2017/02/28/after-disrupting-brexit-crowdfunding-and-crowdjustice-come-to-the-us/

02/27/2017

"Rodney Cruz was born an American citizen. He did a tour in Iraq during 10 years in the Army, and was wounded on the battlefield three times, eventually suffering a traumatic brain injury. His enlistment followed in the footsteps of many of his relatives, an unbroken line of military service. Five successive generations of his family have put their lives on the line for the country, but like four million other Americans in the U.S. territories, Cruz, as a resident of Guam, is constitutionally barred from voting in federal elections.

"But with some help from a brand-new legal platform, Cruz intends to change that."

Read more on CrowdJustice in the The Atlantic - https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/02/guam-territories-lawsuit-voting-rights/517881/

Residents of the U.S. territories can’t vote in federal elections, so they’re tapping into new tools to try to change that.

02/21/2017

ICYMI, OpenGov Inc featured on A1 of The Mercury News!

“Prospective employees and investors are kind of flocking to the business,” Bookman said, “and saying, ‘I want to be a part of this. I’m tired of photo sharing or mobile apps or mobile games. I want to do something important and meaningful.'”

Despite Silicon Valley’s pervasive negative feelings toward the president, the new administration has been a boon for some tech companies.

02/14/2017

What if I told you that a hundred thousand San Franciscans, including thousands of public school students did not have electricity or water at home? I imagine many of you would be appalled and call for our government to step in and help. Now, substitute the Internet for water and electricity.

According to the latest analysis from the City more than a hundred thousand residents in the land of Twitter and Salesforce, do not have access to the Internet at home. We can fix this.

About the Event: Internet access is the lifeblood of our society and economy. It brings opportunity for education, connection, and prosperity. Imagine a life without internet access; this is a reality for 100,000 of San Francisco's population. That's right, in the hub of tech innovation, 100,000 res...

02/11/2017

CrowdJustice is helping "turn legal cases into publicly funded — and backed — social causes."

The Washington Post has more...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/want-to-help-fight-legal-battles-theres-a-crowdfunding-site-for-that/2017/02/10/a7fcb7f2-ec90-11e6-b7e8-df81bd6c4c30_story.html?postshare=2571486752854184&tid=ss_tw

CrowdJustice.org promises to help raise money for public-interest lawsuits, and it is emerging in the United States just as a flurry of cases challenge Trump’s policies.

02/09/2017

CrowdJustice's efforts to help refugees affected by Trump's Muslim ban featured in today's The New York Times.

"CrowdJustice, sped up its opening in the United States after Mr. Trump’s executive order. The first American campaign on the site raised $36,000 to pay for the lawyers of two Yemeni brothers who were deported after arriving at Dulles International Airport in Virginia."

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/09/us/travel-ban-crowdfunding.html?smid=tw-nytnational&smtyp=cur&_r=0

Fund-raising sites have let friends, neighbors and total strangers cover the expenses hanging over immigrants left in limbo by President Trump’s travel ban.

02/07/2017

WIRED weighs in on the importance of the national expansion of Digital Democracy in the Trump era of alternative facts. The interactive video platform empowers advocates with easy access to policy information through a simple search engine that is as easy to use as Google or YouTube.

"No one knows better than Sam Blakeslee that your elected officials operate in the shadows. No one is sure what they do or what they say."

A new platform uses artificial intelligence to let voters keep track of every official word uttered by state legislators.

02/02/2017

Reuters weights in on CrowdJustice's launch to help those affected by Trump's Muslim ban.

"We moved our U.S. launch so that we could go live right after the immigration executive order was announced to give a platform to raise money and support and increase public awareness for legal cases," Chief Executive Office Julia Salasky said in an interview on Thursday.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/r-crowdfunding-startup-speeds-us-launch-thanks-to-trump-travel-ban-2017-2

Opposition to Trump's immigration curbs has proved a boon for CrowdJustice, which helps individuals and organizations raise money to fund legal cases.

02/01/2017

Been a whirlwind 24 hours. Proud to be involved in helping launch CrowdJustice in the US! Please consider donating to hire lawyers to defend, challenge and advise refugees, detainees, immigrants and all those impacted by Trump's Muslim ban.

More: https://www.crowdjustice.org/case/dullesdetainees/

U.S. officials forced up to 60 people to surrender their legal status, according to a suit CrowdJustice is supporting.