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Neighborhood social networking gets city imprimatur

Mayor Menino, Police Commissioner Ed Davis and other city officials gathered at the Milky Way this morning to announce a partnership with Neighbors for Neighbors, a social-networking effort setting up online gathering spots for 18 Boston neighborhoods.

Porcelli
Porcelli

Under the partnership, community liaisons at all of the city's police districts have been trained in using the system, according to Joseph Porcelli, the site's founder and himself a former community service officer in District 13. The city is not providing any financial support for the effort, which has a volunteer development director and is applying for a $225,000 Knight News Challenge grant.

Menino said the city will also share other information with the network, such as events information. He said the network is another example of the city providing the information residents need, pointing to recent efforts as police tweets, H1N1 YouTube videos and a system for letting iPhone users upload pothole photos to the city.

Davis said the network will help police reach a community with whom police have traditionally had little contact: Young urban professionals.

"Quite frankly, they have better things to do than hanging out with a bunch of cops, and I understand this," he said, adding, "My kids were absolutely devastated when I got a Facebook account. They would not friend me."

Steve Garfield posted some photos on Flickr as the event was going on, including this panorama of attendees.

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Comments

Sounds like a great way to connect the city, especially for us young people. I also like the Mayor's IPhone app idea that he came up with earlier this year.

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Nothing says "neighbor to neighbor" more than a presentation given by a police cop with a gun, club, and taser in his belt!

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I'm still trying to figure out what this city-led initiative is all about. $1 million in funding and what exactly does it do??

http://www.bostonworldpartnerships.com/

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Dear Friends,

This is a reminder of our upcoming graduating MBA's event. Every year, Greater Boston's globally-renowned business schools graduate an army of young, highly-educated, driven professionals. Arguably no other metropolitan area imparts such an influence in the global business community. Truly, Boston is producing the next generation of international market shapers.

On October 28th, Boston World Partnerships will be the first organization to convene 200 second-year MBA students from 10+ business schools in the area and 100 BWP-invited business leaders and BWP Connectors in a room to exchange insights and ideas.

Join us on this day to meet with the next rising stars of the international business community and share with them opportunities that are unique to Boston. Please remember that you MUST RSVP in order to attend, so reserve your spot today!

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If Ed Davis carried a weapon, he concealed it well.

Davis

Dan Linsky and E-13 Capt. John Greland were in uniform, but they didn't seem the least bit frightening. They even smiled.

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Nice event, always great to be @ Milky Way

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See, that's what happens when you spend 18 months covering Natick, where they have a state rep with a similar name (and never mind it was so long ago that back then he was just an assistant DA).

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Howard L? You mean the guy Menino pushed aside when he promoted Kineavy?

Oh yeah, Linsky, the friend of Kineavy. What an incestuous bunch.

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Sorry to disappoint you ...left in 04 after the DNC and a great ride of 20 years with Ray Flynn and Tom Menino, never had an issue w/Michael, in fact, introduced him to John Walsh at the start of the 06 Governor's race to keep an open channel w/the Patrick folks. Still friends today.

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