Alan Palazzolo

I am driven to make the world a better place through collaboration, open source, and community with a focus on telling compelling stories with data and code.

Summary

• Managing the user experience of VoteShield, a platform that monitors and analyzes voter registration databases for anomalous and malicious activity.
• Developed tools, analyzed data, and built visual and interactive content as the Newsroom Developer at the Star Tribune.
• Enhanced both audio and digital as a Front-end Developer on the WNYC DataNews team as well as building tools to improve productivity for multiple teams.
• Created data-driven stories as the Interactive News Developer at MinnPost and developing news applications and data visualizations.
• Built web applications for community engagement as an inaugural 2011 Fellow at Code for America, with a focus on agile, test-driven development.
• Co-authored a book entitled Mapping with Drupal published by O’Reilly Media.
• Exploring the connection of art, hardware, code, and community through projects like the Aurora Shanty, Lacu and Lumiere.
• Organized many events and communities and founded local groups including Open Twin Cities, the Twin Cities Data Visualization group, and Free Geek Twin Cities.
• Managed a small web team as well as sustainably upgraded and fully restructured the resource library as the Web Manager at Shelter Centre, a small NGO in Geneva, Switzerland.

Professional experience

Front-end Engineer at VoteShield

Working to create an impactful, informative, and enjoyable user experience that helps election administrators and internal analysts monitor anomalous activity in voter registration data.

• Leading large, architectural shifts in the application to improve stability, performance, and developer and analyst experience.
• Collaborating with election administrators and internal analysts to design impactful interfaces for monitoring data.
• Implementing and refining minimalistic, intuitive design.
• Ensuring secure access to voter registration data and analysis throughout the application.
• Improving Python API for efficiency, performance, and security.
• Engaging across Protect Democracy to collaborate on technology projects such as small, one-off sites.
• Rebuilt the React-based user-interface from the ground-up to improve user experience and performance.

Newsroom Developer at Star Tribune

Worked across the newsroom to elevate digital story-telling in the organization as well as improved workflows and processes.

• Worked with reporters and editors to analyze data and create visuals to inform and enhance content.
• Collaborated with the digital design team and others in the newsroom to elevate the digital building workflows.
• Built and deployed elections infrastructure and front-end utilizing data from the Associated Press and the Minnesota Secretary of State, allowing our readers to see the results of every race in Minnesota for the midterm.
• Built the Super Bowl guide, a progressive web app designed to help visitors in town for the Super Bowl find activities and events.

Front-end Developer at WNYC

Part of the DataNews team, we worked independently and with other staff in the newsroom to enhance audio and digital pieces with data analysis, visuals, and interactive experiences.

• Worked with reporters to request, parse, and analyze data relevant to stories.
• Collaborated with our team to create visual pieces and stories.
• Created open source tools to help our staff as well as other organizations work more effectively.
• Built InfoMagical, an experimental texting engagement piece for the Note to Self podcast.
• Created Landslide, an information gathering system used for the ElectionLand project, under a very quick deadline.
• Invited to participate in an OpenNews Code/Documentation Convening focused on creating an open source playbook for newsrooms.

Interactive News Developer at MinnPost

Implementing interactive stories and pieces in collaboration with reporters and the data team.

• Worked closely with reporters and editors to supplement stories with visual and interactive elements.
• Created original content from start to finish.
• Collaborated with the data team to create interactive stories based on compelling data sets.
• Promoted and implemented open source policies; making almost all code written open from the start.
• Experimented with open source technologies to enable new and cost-effective ways of telling the news.
• Built reusable tools and libraries for internal and external use.
• Participated in the week-long ProPublica P5 to make the State Bill Tracker more usable for other news organizations.
• Invited to participate in an OpenNews Code Convening focused on elections and made our Election Night API reusable.

Code for America Fellow

Created open source tools for cities to utilize and replicate in multiple places, while shifting culture around technology use within government.

• Worked closely with the city of Seattle, while interviewing community members, to create solutions that fit the city’s goals as service providers to citizens.
• Lead team in open sourcing main project focusing on enhancing civic engagement and encouraging citizens to address neighborhood needs.
• Launched project in both Seattle and Philadelphia.
• Actively learned new technologies, including Python and Node.js, on own and engaging other fellows with specific expertise.
• Mentored Google Summer of Code students in building PHP-based civic API wrappers.
• Built application focused on team building that highlights code commits.

Web Manager at Shelter Centre

Administered, developed, and enhanced the organization’s web services, as well as managed the entire office technology infrastructure.

• Created and implemented upgrade path to Drupal 6 that focused on removing unnecessary structures, migrating to a more sustainable infrastructure, adding new geo-focused functionality, and all while minimizing downtime to the site.
• Managed multiple assistants with focus in areas such as systems administration, web administration, and web content management.
• Created and maintained a documentation repository that fully describes the infrastructure and services in the office.
• Enhanced the office and web infrastructure with open source tools to provide a stable, sustainable, robust, and scalable system.

Senior Developer at Chicago Technology Cooperative

• Developed multiple Drupal solutions for the custom needs of non-profit organizations, with a focus on mapping and integrating CiviCRM.
• Collaborated in small teams to analyze, architect, and implement web application solutions.
• Created many custom Drupal modules to fit the needs of various projects, mainly modules that added integration between Drupal and CiviCRM.
• Planned and implemented migration paths for both sites and data.
• Lead an internal documentation initiative to help better organize the companies collective intellectual resources.

Database Administrator at Minneapolis College of Art and Design

Administered multiple MS SQL Server instances. Focused on cleaning, enhancing, and maintaining Jenzabar, an education-focused, integrated, database application. Maintained and developed multiple web sites and web servers. Focused on adding functionality to existing web sites.

• Provided technical support as well as created and lead a Jenzabar User Group.
• Enhanced security of both MS SQL Server and Jenzabar allowing for easier management and scalability.
• Collaborated with other IT members to establish sustainable development environment, including code versioning and backups.
• Worked towards standardizing and modularizing the code base for the multiple web sites.
• Optimized Apache and server configurations to significantly improve performance.

Publishing

• Contributed to and enhanced content at Star Tribune.
• Analysis, coding, and reporting at WNYC.
• Designed, coded, and wrote articles on MinnPost.
• Articles written for Source (Open News) on keeping costs down on news apps, the Legislature Tracker, as well as Simple Map and Tulip.
• Co-authored book entitled Mapping with Drupal published by O’Reilly Media, focused on providing a solid base for Drupal site builders and architects to get up to speed with web mapping and specifically mapping in Drupal.

Speaking engagements

• Presented on Command-line enlightenment at SRCCON 2018.
• Co-facilitated session on Newsroom collaborations at SRCCON 2017.
• Led an experimental Playtime at SRCCON 2016.
• Led a discussion on Front-end tools at SRCCON 2015.
• Co-presented about visualization and the physical world at Signal 2015.
• Led a discussion on Style Guides at the first SRCCON.
• Led a discussion about Open Data at a Black Box Monday event put on by the Minnesota Society of Professional Journalists.
• Demoed Lumière at JavascriptMN; (video).
• Led a discussion on Open Data and Journalism at MozFest 2013.
• Gave a presentation on Telling Stories with Data as a part of the Digital Arts Sciences + Humanities (DASH) Series at the University of Minnesota; (video).
• Shared initial thoughts on Ractive at the JavascriptMN Meetup.
• Spoke on why not to use Drupal at the Twin Cities Drupal Camp 2013.
• Explained Data Visualization in the Newsroom to a Data Journalism class at the University of Minnesota.
• Gave a talk about the MinnPost Nice Ride visualization and another about D3.js at the Twin Cities Data Visualization meetup.
• Presented about data visualization to the University of Minnesota’s Code People group, the Twin Cities Research Group, and the Twin Cities Web Design group.
• On a panel about data visualization hosted by the Minnesota School of Journalism.
• On a panel about open source in government at Open Gov West 2011 Portland.
• Gave a presentation on the state of geospatial in Drupal entitled Spatially Drupal at DrupalCamp Twin Cities.
• Co-presented Making Beautiful Maps (video) at DrupalCon Chicago 2011.
• Co-presented Mapping with OpenLayers (video) at DrupalCon Copenhagen
• Featured speaker at Drupal Dev Days in Munich and spoke on both Coding Standards and OpenLayers.
• Featured speaker presenting on OpenLayers at DrupalCamp Spain.
• Co-presented on OpenLayers at DrupalCon Paris.
• Spoke about Drupal coding standards and best practices at DrupalCamp Wisconsin.

Community leadership

I am active in fostering and creating in-person and online communities.

• Reviewed, judged, and consulted on CURA:Tech, a small grants program for civic technology focused on communities of color and low income communities.
• Helped organize Visualizing Neighborhoods, Hack for MN, Capitol Code, Open Data Day 2013, and other local hackathon-like events.
• Co-founded and help organize Open Twin Cities, a group focused on creating a better collaborative citizen experience through technology.
• Co-founded Free Geek Twin Cities, a Free Geek chapter in the Minneapolis area.
• Founded and organize the Twin Cities (Data) Visualization meetup, a local, monthly meet-up community of practice with over 600 members.
• Co-organized the first Drupal Non-Profit Summit at the 2011 Bay Area Drupal Camp.
• Led the first ever Code Review Sprint to review project applications at DrupalCon Chicago 2011
• Led a number of BoF (Bird of Feather) discussions at DrupalCon Chicago 2011, including Drupal Geospatial Stack and Drupal and Government.
• Led the Drupal geospatial BoF and cvs application reviewing BoF at DrupalCon Copenhagen.
• Jump-started the Swiss Romandy Drupal User Group.
• Helped organize and lead a BoF about OpenLayers and GIS in Drupal at DrupalCon Paris.
• Organized a Twin Cities Documentation Sprint.
• Started a successful, monthly Twin Cities Drupal Happy Hour.
• Co-organized a Drupal Camp in the Twin Cities called Drupal Daze.

Events

The following are some of the more significant events I have attended over the years that have not been mentioned previously.

• Participated in 2-day Shorenstein Center election coverage workshop.
• Attended NICAR 2017, 2015, 2014, 2013, and 2012.
• Participated in 2-day human-centered design workshop via CURA:Tech.
• Attended FOSS4G North America 2013.
• Attended CityCampMN 2013.
• Attended Eyeo 2013 and 2018.
• Attended the Code for America Summit 2012.
• Attended Open Gov West 2011 Portland.
• Participated in Hack for Change and created Safehood.
• Participated in Code for Oakland and created ComTXT.
• Attended WhereCamp San Francisco 2011.
• Attended Where Conf 2011.
• Attended DrupalCon London, Chicago, Copenhagen, Paris, and DC.
• Participated in F1 Overnight Website Challenge in 2009.
• Attended the Twin Cities event Drupal Day.

Formal education

BBA, Computer Information Systems from Appalachian State University

2000 - 2004, Boone, NC, USA

A comprehensive program that focused on various systems and project management. I was Team Leader and Lead Programmer on final project building payroll system for current employer.