The City of San Diego is expanding features in its popular Get It Done reporting tool to give residents more precise ways to report problems in parks and to provide clearer timelines for fixes.
More specific park reporting, smartphone rollout
The online service already lets residents alert municipal staff to issues ranging from graffiti to abandoned vehicles. Under the recent enhancement, tipsters can now select from 46 specific kinds of park problems instead of filing a general parks complaint, officials said. The category-specific options were added to the Get It Done website in February and will be extended to the smartphone app in late summer or early fall.
City leaders emphasized the importance of the app’s mobile reach: more than 75% of Get It Done complaints are submitted from smartphones. Since 2016 the system has processed approximately 3.5 million complaints and the smartphone app has been downloaded about 275,000 times.
Estimated repair times and data-driven transparency
The expansion also introduces complaint-specific time estimates for when a reported problem is likely to be resolved. Officials say the change is intended to improve transparency, set reasonable expectations for residents and discourage repeat filings for the same issue.
"The city hopes to use data from the new category-specific complaints to make the time estimates more precise and reliable," said Conrad Wear, a city program manager overseeing the parks portion of Get It Done.
Wear oversees the parks portion of the program and told city staff the category data should allow the city to calibrate response windows more accurately. The Get It Done system already helps staff by providing photographs and precise location data from users’ phones, which officials say boosts the accuracy of reports.
Quick QR reporting for off‑leash dogs at joint-use parks
Another new feature is a special quick-response QR code aimed at reporting illegal off‑leash dogs in parks that the city operates jointly with local schools. City officials described off‑leash activity as a recurring, controversial problem that can lead to fouling of fields where children play.
Officials said the QR code will allow faster reporting and responses intended to discourage illegal off‑leash behavior. Rapid reporting, they contend, could reduce health and safety risks associated with dog waste on athletic fields and play areas.
Workload and scale
Get It Done fields a high volume of requests: the city receives more than 1,000 complaints a day, with roughly 700 of those related to parks and other municipal services, according to officials. The platform has been credited with streamlining reports about homeless encampments, illegal dumping, flooding and other problems.
| Metric | figure |
|---|---|
| Total complaints since 2016 | 3.5 million |
| App downloads | 275,000 |
| Complaints per day | 1,000+ |
City officials plan to use the improved categorization and timing estimates to target resources and improve service delivery, though they say the smartphone app version needs the late summer or early fall upgrade to bring the full feature set to users who file most complaints on mobile devices.
- Residents will be able to pick from 46 park problem categories when filing complaints.
- New time estimates for fixes aim to improve transparency and reduce duplicate complaints.
- A dedicated QR code will let residents quickly report illegal off‑leash dogs at joint-use parks.
The Get It Done platform marked its 10th anniversary this spring. City officials say continued upgrades seek to make it easier for residents to document problems and for staff to deploy repairs efficiently.
