Danielle Ungermann is the events coordinator of Code for Miami, which Knight Foundation supports to help attract and keep talented people and expand opportunity in South Florida by connecting innovators and entrepreneurs.

When you look around Miami, it’s not at first apparent just how many opportunities there are to help make a difference.

Drawing together developers, designers, data geeks, leaders, government folks and idea-makers, Code for Miami has spent the last two years helping pave the way for civic engagement in Miami-Dade County. To get an idea, here are some of the projects we’ve completed just within the last year:

• GIS Bus Tracking system
• Miami Open 211
• Miami Wiki
• Developed a twitterbot titled Cute Pets to help Miami-Dade County Animal Services send foster pets to great homes.
• Miami Answers, which sources answers to commonly asked questions about Miami.
• Contributed to Eyes on the Rise’s sea level rise visualization. 

This has all happened because a few people have volunteered a couple hours of their time every Monday night at The LAB Miami in Wynwood.

Code for Miami, a Code for America brigade that was started during the inaugural National Day of Civic Hacking, invites you now to join us in accomplishing many more firsts at this year’s #HackforChange event on Saturday, June 6, at The LAB Miami.

Through a series of nationwide daylong events, #HackforChange will bring together thousands of volunteering residents, community groups and government folks to collaborate to make their communities stronger. Nationally, this year’s event is sponsored by Code for America, SecondMuse and NASA, with the theme of “Principles for 21st Century Government.”

Code for Miami’s #HackforChange event, sponsored by Knight Foundation, will focus on four areas:

• Transportation
• Disaster preparedness and relief
• Climate change
• Florida’s state vendor payments

Unique to Miami’s event is Florida’s first statewide challenge in which brigades and National Day of Civic Hacking cities from across Florida will work to create visualizations and apps from state open data on vendor payments from the last five years. Florida CFO Jeff Atwater is providing the date and plans to be there to help kick off the event.

Other challenges will focus on using County 311 and GIS open data, prioritizing data sets Code for Miami would like to get opened in Miami, and drafting community ideas for an open data policy.

Breakfast, lunch and snacks will be provided free to guests with a special after-party taking place at Concrete Beach Brewery in Wynwood.

The National Day of Civic Hacking #HackforChange will take place on Saturday, June 6, from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. at The LAB Miami, 400 NW 26th St., Miami. To RSVP, visit Eventbrite.

Join in the conversation with #hackforchange, #opendata, and @codeformiami. Code for Miami meets weekly at 7 p.m. on Mondays at the The LAB Miami.