Civic Change Engine
Database Architecture & Taxonomy
312
Focus Areas
across 7 themes of community life
Our Health
48
focus areas
Our Families
43
focus areas
Our Neighborhood
49
focus areas
Our Voice
43
focus areas
Our Money
48
focus areas
Our Planet
43
focus areas
The Bigger We
38
focus areas
Federal & International Crosswalks
Every focus area maps to standard classification systems
UN SDGs
17
Sustainable Dev Goals
NTEE
23
IRS Nonprofit Codes
AIRS/211
32
Human Services
SDOH
6
Social Determinants
CFDA
23
Federal Programs
14 Action Types
Ways users can engage with civic life
Learn
Meet
Volunteer
Get Trained
Take Action
Donate
Advocate
Vote
Organize
Mentor
Report
Attend
Sign
Share
Data Ingestion Pipeline
External APIs → Processing → Platform → Users
External APIs
Google Civic
Congress.gov
Open States
VolunteerMatch
Eventbrite
FindHelp
211/HSDS
ProPublica
Census
Processing
1. Fetch
2. Stage
3. Transform
4. AI Classify
5. Simplify
6. Embed
7. Review
Platform
📚 Learning Center
Resources
Legislation
⚡ Action Center
Opportunities
Events
🔗 Resource Center
Services
Benefits
🏛️ Who's Responsible
Officials
Positions
User Experience
Semantic Search
Geo Filter
Personalization
Saved Items
Dashboards
API Access
Sync Schedule
On-Demand
Google Civic
Daily
VolunteerMatch, Eventbrite
Weekly
FindHelp, 211, Congress
Monthly
ProPublica (990s)
34
Database Tables
Reference (11)
themes
focus_areas
sdgs
action_types
time_commitments
resource_types
service_categories
positions
jurisdictions
policy_types
government_levels
Content (10)
organizations
opportunities
events
resources
services
agencies
legislation
legislation_content
officials
benefits
Crosswalks (5)
sdg_mappings
ntee_codes
airs_codes
sdoh_codes
cfda_codes
Geography (3)
user_geography
service_areas
neighborhoods
Users (5)
users
user_profiles
user_activity
partner_orgs
api_keys
Key Relationships
Focus Areas ↔ Everything
Every content item links to one or more of 312 focus areas
Organizations ↔ Content
Orgs have many opportunities, events, services, resources
Officials ↔ Jurisdictions
38 position types at Federal, State, County, City levels
Users ↔ Geography
Each user has ZIP, census tract, voting districts
12
External API Integrations
🏛️ Officials & Geography
Google Civic Information
Elected officials at all levels by address
Census Geocoder
Address → FIPS, tract, districts
TIGERweb
Geographic boundary data
📜 Legislation
Congress.gov
Federal bills, laws, amendments
Open States
State legislation (all 50 states)
Federal Register
Regulations, comment periods
⚡ Opportunities & Events
VolunteerMatch
Volunteer opportunities (100K+ orgs)
Eventbrite
Community events, workshops
🔗 Services & Organizations
FindHelp
Social services, benefits
211 / Open Referral
Human services data
ProPublica
990 data for 1.8M+ nonprofits
MVP Priority Order
1. Google Civic
2. Census Geocoder
3. VolunteerMatch
4. Congress.gov
5. 211/HSDS
6. Eventbrite
7. Open States
8. ProPublica
9. FindHelp
Phase 1 (MVP)
Phase 2
Phase 3