By Khalida Sarwari and Judy Peterson
If you’re looking for someone to “poke,” then Nextdoor.com may not be the site for you. But if you’re looking to find a babysitter in your neighborhood, then Nextdoor is the place to go.
The social networking site was launched this month in Saratoga and offers what Facebook, the site to which it often draws comparison, doesn’t: a private way for residents of a neighborhood to communicate about everything from the next block party to alerting others about a robbery down the street.
The San Francisco-based company was founded in 2010 and has since expanded to more than 3,000 neighborhoods in 11 states. Saratoga is one of the latest cities to get in on the action.
Individual Nextdoor neighborhood sites throughout the city have been created to allow neighbors to introduce themselves and interact with one another. Access to each neighborhood site is limited to verified residents of the specific neighborhood.
What sets Nextdoor apart from Yahoo groups and email distribution lists–methods of communication that people have been using to share information among themselves–is that the site offers a centralized location for people to converse on one website that is easier to maintain, said Saratoga City Councilman Chuck Page.
The site also allows city officials to communicate en masse with the various neighborhoods, but it does not have access to the information or messages shared among neighbors through the website.
“There are a lot of different ways to communicate, but this is another one that looks like it’s got good functionality and is defined,” Page said. “It seems like a really good tool.”
Nextdoor launched in Los Gatos a year ago and has expanded since then from the original six neighborhoods to 21. In addition, Nextdoor’s Michelle Magat says another four neighborhoods are at the pilot stage, meaning they are collecting the required 10 sign-ups needed to launch a group.
When Los Gatos resident Catherine Briggs first heard about the program, she was intrigued and looked into it. Briggs lives in Surrey Farms, which is off Kennedy Road.
“My vision was to have a more cohesive neighborhood with older and younger neighbors participating,” Briggs said. “I wanted to have the kids helping out the older folks. If someone has knee or hip surgery we should be bringing in their garbage cans. You don’t pay for it; this is what your neighbors do for you.”
Briggs says she’s pleased with the way Nextdoor has worked out. Approximately 80 percent of the Surrey Farms residents have joined.
“It has mixed the generations,” she said. “There have been no problems with people soliciting or using the list for fundraising.”
Briggs said that occasionally, once every three months or so, the town of Los Gatos will use the list to send out information on emergency preparedness or about crimes such as auto burglaries. But she adds, “It isn’t a nuisance.”
For the most part, Briggs says Nextdoor has achieved what she’d hoped. “We had a coffee for all the women during the holidays. The women were from 25 to 90. And we had someone find a purse after a party and used Nextdoor to track down the owner,” Briggs said. “We’ve also used it for lost dogs, lost cats … things like that.”
When an eighth-grader at Fisher Middle School was looking for a veteran to interview for the school’s Veterans Day observance, he used Nextdoor to query his neighbors, one of whom eventually connected him with a veteran.
A Mother’s Day luncheon is in the offing, too, Briggs said.
Overall, she gives the organization high marks. Her advice for newcomers, however, is to look at the boundaries that are presented for your neighborhood and if they’re too big change them.
“Modify the boundaries to suit your needs,” Briggs said.
Nextdoor is free for users, and there is no cost to the city for making the site available to residents. Residents are required to use their real names and addresses so that neighbors can confirm their identity.
To register, visit nextdoor.com.
