Moses Lake starts new program to track city repairs, answer questions

MOSES LAKE — Now typically, when a business or an agency does the ribbon-cutting thing, they’re cutting a ribbon for a building, or because they moved to a new location, or because they have a new service truck – a physical asset. The Moses Lake City Council cut a ribbon Tuesday on a new web portal, making it a unique occasion.  

Lizabeth Murillo-Busby, assistant to the city manager, said the “See, Click, Fix” program is designed to give people an easy way to report non-emergency problems around the city and track what’s done to fix them. 

“As a city, we wanted to create a simple and consistent way for residents to report issues,” Murillo-Busby said. 

It’s designed to improve communication between residents and city government, she said, by giving people a way to see what happens when they report something. 

“On top of our regular (schedule), all the work that we’re already doing, we’re also going to be able to show the community and our council members all the additional service requests that we’re doing,” she said. 

The program is now available on the city’s website, under the “report a problem” tab on the top of the page. There’s also a phone app.  

City manager Rob Karlinsey said it’ll be a work in progress for a while. 

“We welcome feedback on how this is working for people,” he said.  

There’s a link for people to report new problems as well as a running list of previous requests. 

“It’s got a live public map showing all the requests and statuses in real time,” Murillo-Busby said.  

The program has a long list of possible problems, from street signs to snow to noise to code enforcement. But people making the request don’t have to know which department will respond to their reports and questions. The program sends it to the most likely destination, and if that’s not right, city employees reroute it.  

The program does ask some questions and allows people to add pictures.  

A leak reported in the city’s sewer system? It was routed to the wastewater division, which found it and fixed it. Hole in a garbage can? The crew in the utility billing department could help the resident get a new one. Traffic light getting twitchy? That one had to be reassigned, but the Streets staff ended up doing some readjusting.  

Not all questions deal with immediate repairs. City officials answered a question about trees around the Civic Center, but said it would require a special review. Another resident asked about boat access to the city park on Crest Island in the middle of Moses Lake. The reply was that the park is intentionally unimproved, but that city officials would take suggestions as part of an upcoming park plan update. 

Questions, complaints and answers are all accessible on the See, Click, Fix page. A map shows questions and complaints received and whether or not they’ve been addressed yet. People can also sign up for email notices to track questions or complaints. 

“Those dots (on the map) show any of those open service requests,” Murillo-Busby said.  

Karlinsey said See, Click, Fix archives all the data, which will allow residents and council members to track where things are happening and how they’re addressed.