Public Service Transparency & Civic Reporting Dashboard
Trilingual geotagged civic issue reporting platform holding local municipal authorities accountable with verifiable resolution timestamps.
Provide every citizen an unalterable, transparent channel to report broken roads, water leaks, and public health hazards, with public SLA accountability.
The Root Challenge
Citizens reporting dangerous open manholes, contaminated water supplies, or unlit rural intersections must navigate opaque government departments, handwritten letters, and bureaucratic apathy. Issues linger unresolved for months with zero public tracking.
Sri Lanka operates 341 local authorities (Municipal Councils, Urban Councils, and Pradeshiya Sabhas). Most possess zero automated grievance handling systems, resulting in deep citizen disillusionment and delayed emergency responses.
Structural Root Causes:
- Zero centralized public tracking; grievances disappear into physical file cabinets
- Lack of public visibility creates no institutional incentive for rapid resolution
- Language barriers: Tamil-speaking citizens in mixed districts encounter Sinhala-only forms and vice versa
Target Community & Beneficiaries
Citizens walking past open sewer pits, downed power lines, or severe potholes.
- Not knowing who has jurisdiction
- Endless phone calls transferred between departments
Local representatives who want to demonstrate transparent constituent responsiveness.
- Overwhelmed by random WhatsApp messages
- No verifiable records of contractor repairs
Organizations tracking municipal fund utilization and regional infrastructure neglect.
- No open data APIs to track local authority repair speeds
The Proposed Solution & Workflow
A public digital public good (DPG) where citizens photograph and pin civic hazards. The platform automatically assigns the ticket to the correct Pradeshiya Sabha based on spatial boundary polygons and starts a public countdown timer.
Operational Model & Governance
Open dashboard displaying all active issues categorized by urgency, ward, and elapsed days. When municipal teams mark an issue resolved, photo verification and community confirmation are required to close the public SLA ticket.
Citizen Engagement Lifecycle
Key Civic-Tech Innovations
Architecture & Engineering Approach
Next.js App Router, Tailwind/Vanilla CSS, PostgreSQL with PostGIS, Supabase Realtime, and Cloudflare R2 image storage with client-side EXIF sanitization.
Local report drafting saves pending submissions to IndexedDB and automatically transmits when connectivity is detected.
Images resized client-side to maximum 800px width before upload, keeping payload < 95KB.
Real-time interface switcher with native Sinhala, Tamil, and English semantic strings.
Citizen phone numbers are hashed; only public anonymized usernames are displayed on maps.
Implementation Milestones
Phase 1: Administrative Boundary Mapping
Q3 2026 · COMPLETEDDigitize and compile GeoJSON polygons for all local authorities in Western and Central Provinces.
Phase 2: Core Reporting Platform & SLA Engine
Q4 2026 · IN PROGRESSBuild trilingual web reporting app and public accountability board.
Phase 3: Civil Society Alpha Trial
Q1 2027 · IN PROGRESSPartner with 2 youth civic groups to test live hazard submission and resolution logging.
Phase 4: Open API & Council Handover
Q2 2027 · IN PROGRESSRelease open REST APIs for municipal authorities and university researchers.
Measurable Success Criteria
Operational Assumptions & Governance Ethics
The dashboard strictly filters private property disputes and personal defamation. All reports are strictly scoped to public infrastructure assets.
- Local authority officials will engage constructively rather than attempt to block public scrutiny
- Sufficient civic momentum exists to sustain community peer-verification
- OpenStreetMap administrative polygon accuracy in rural areas
- Reliable telecommunication SMS gateways for status notification delivery