Our Story

It started in the audience of a local fire district board meeting.

While attending the meeting, I noticed something that seemed simple but had bigger implications. A closed session item had been placed on the agenda incorrectly. It wasn’t intentional—just another example of dedicated public servants trying to navigate complicated laws with limited resources and very little administrative support.

Driving home that evening, one thought kept running through my mind.

The first idea wasn’t to build meeting management software.

It was simply to create a tool that could help local agencies avoid common Brown Act mistakes by identifying closed session items that required additional legal review.

That idea quickly evolved.

As I began working with more agencies, I noticed something else. Most agendas were being created by copying old Microsoft Word documents. Formatting problems, outdated language, and simple clerical mistakes were being carried forward from one meeting to the next.

The software wasn’t the problem.

So I set out to build something that would eliminate repetitive tasks while reducing the kinds of errors that consume valuable staff time.

Finding the right development partner wasn’t easy. After working through several unsuccessful attempts, I met Thuy Nguyen. Together, we built the first version of what would eventually become CivAssist.

Our first customer was the Redwood Valley Municipal Advisory Council. They agreed to help us test new ideas, suggest improvements, and provide honest feedback. (And yes… they’re still using CivAssist today.)

In those early years, progress was steady but deliberate. Like many small businesses, there were careers to maintain, bills to pay, and a family to raise. CivAssist continued to evolve one agency, one idea, and one improvement at a time.

As more agencies began using CivAssist, something interesting happened. The software wasn’t just being tested—it was being used every day by clerks, managers, executive assistants, and other local government professionals. Their feedback, combined with my own experience working alongside public agencies, continually shaped the software into what it is today.

That’s one of the things that makes CivAssist different. It wasn’t built by software developers guessing how local government works. It was refined by the people who actually use it.

Over time, one solution led to another. Meeting management grew into public records management. Public records led to document accessibility. Agencies asked for better website integration. Meeting videos evolved into AI-powered meeting summaries. Each new product began the same way—with a conversation about a real-world challenge.

We never set out to build a software company.

We simply kept listening to the agencies we serve and building practical solutions that made their jobs a little easier.

Today, CivAssist continues to evolve the same way it always has—not from a corporate roadmap, but from conversations with the agencies we serve and the real-world challenges they face every day.