Emerald City users of Nextdoor now have a new away to stay on top of news from the City of Seattle, thanks to a new partnership between the neighborhood-focused social network and city leaders.
The City won’t get access to users’ posts to the service, but will now be able to share key information with people who use the social network to communicate about goings-on in their neighborhood.
City Social Media Manager Joe Mirabella told GeekWire in an email that the Seattle Police Department was the first organization to join the service, and will be sharing neighborhood-specific information about what’s going on with the police.
“The Mayor’s Office and Mayor Ed Murray will also use Nextdoor for outreach about various subjects, such as public safety, emergency preparedness, and other neighborhood specific events and topics,” he said. “Because Nextdoor has reached such a significant saturation of users, we did not feel we would be doing our job as communicators if we did not start using this platform. Residents also have asked us to join the platform and regularly asked Nextdoor to work with our City.”
In a note to one Nextdoor user, the company had this to say:
The purpose of these updates is to share official alerts, news, and other notifications that are relevant to your neighborhood. It’s important to note that city staff can only see their own posts and replies to these posts. They will NOT be able to access or view any information that you and your neighbors have shared…
It’s another in a long series of partnerships between the Silicon Valley-based social network and cities around the country. So far, Nextdoor has teamed up with more than 250 cities.
The company has other Seattle connections, including early backing from Zillow co-founder and former Expedia CEO Rich Barton. The company raised $60 million in venture funding last year, including cash from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Comcast Ventures, Tiger Global Management, Benchmark, Greylock Partners, and Shasta Ventures.
