What Spokane is asking for
People come to the Spokane Community Assistant with a need. This page shows, in aggregate, what those needs are and how well the community's services answered them. It is meant for residents, service providers, funders, and the city: a live, anonymous needs assessment.
Last 90 days · updated hourly · 404 requests in 92 conversations
By kind of help
The dark part of each bar is requests that got a weak or no match.
Specific needs
Finer labels; one request can carry several.
By area
Where people searched from, by ZIP code rolled up into ten regions. Shown only when a ZIP was entered.
Language
5% of requests were spoken rather than typed.
Urgency
How soon the help was needed, as far as the request made clear.
How this is made
The assistant never stores what a person typed or said. Each request is reduced to fixed labels (the kind of help, how urgent, which services were suggested and how well they matched, the ZIP code if one was entered, and the language) and the words are discarded. Nothing about who is asking is recorded. This page shows only groups of 10 or more requests.
The same numbers are available as open data at /api/needs (JSON, updated hourly). Read the privacy notice for the full rule. Service providers who see a gap in their area and want to be listed can write to vivek@plainwords.io.
A product of Plain Words LLC, built by Vivek Patil. In an emergency call 911. For crisis support, call or text 988.