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 Two winters and two months of coding later, the friends are ready to
launch Heat Seek NYC in late October in collaboration with two
not-for-profit groups.
The new Web app, which tracks ambient temperatures inside apartments
with an Internet-connected sensor, is designed to be used by New
Yorker renters, who filed some 214,000 complaints last year alone,
according to the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and
Development. The data recorded on the app produces a log that can be
printed and taken to housing court.
"Our goal is to keep the heat on this winter," Hunter said.
Heat Seek NYC is among a growing number of tech-based tools for
tenants and their advocates to force slack landlords to toe the
line. Another is SquaredAway Chicago, a Web app designed to bolster
tenant requests for repairs by recording them on a third-party
server. The program is being replicated by local housing groups in
Vermont, Boston and Washington, D.C.
Also in the works is RentRocket, a website that uses crowd-sourced
data to show the full cost of rental properties, including utility
fees. It is expected to debut in at least 10 U.S. cities from
Bloomington, Indiana, to Burlington, Vermont.
Finally, under development in Los Angeles is an app called Tenants
in Action, which will report housing violations in English and
Spanish directly to city agencies.
With renters constituting up to 35 percent of households nationwide
in early 2013, according to a report by Harvard University's Joint
Center for Housing Studies, there should be no shortage of
complaints in sight.
The new apps are part of a trend by not-for-profits toward making
new technologies available to benefit a wider audience, said
Annemarie Spitz of the Chicago-based firm Greater Good Studio, which
uses design methods to solve civic issues.
In the end, the high-tech apps will do something as low-tech but
essential as establishing a paper trail, albeit electronic, said
John Bartlett, director of Metropolitan Tenants Organization, which
worked with Spitz to build SquaredAway Chicago.
"One of the issues that we continually come up against with tenants
is that everything is verbal, so there's no way to properly document
what's happened," Bartlett said.
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"Rental housing is a business transaction, and proper business
etiquette is you put things in writing," he said.
Between October 2013 and May 2014, New York City completed about
$5.1 million in emergency repairs when building owners failed to
restore heat, hot water or both after being served with violation
notices, according to the housing department.
Heat Seek NYC requires the installation of a temperature sensor
inside an apartment. The tenant then uses a free app to compare the
sensor data against outdoor temperatures and indoor requirements set
by the New York City heating code to identify violations as they
occur.
In New York, landlords are required to heat buildings to at least 68
degrees Fahrenheit when daytime temperatures fall below 55 degrees
outside. At night, the inside temperature must be at least 55
degrees Fahrenheit" when it is 40 degrees or less outside.
Pricing plans for the sensor are still in the works, although the
cost is expected to range from $30 to $80.
Heat Seek NYC plans to donate 100 sensors to low-income households
this year and to give away another 1,000 after an online fundraising
campaign.
(Editing by Barbara Goldberg and Eric Walsh)
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