Services
South Side Sarah is your neighborhood’s 24/7 voice assistant, built to support local businesses, nonprofits, and community groups. She answers calls and texts with up-to-date information, promotes events, and keeps residents connected to what’s happening — all without extra staff, apps, or expensive software. From store hours to cleanup days, Sarah speaks for your organization instantly and professionally, giving you more visibility, more time, and more impact. Whether you're a sponsor, a partner, or just curious, Sarah is here to serve the South Side — one conversation at a time.
We don't need to get married!
You don’t have to overhaul your entire operation to get help from Sarah. Whether you’re running a small shop, planning community events, or just want someone else to answer the same five questions you hear every day — Sarah fits right into what you’re already doing. No tech headaches. No long-term contracts. No need to "make it official." She’s just here to help.
Always-On Outreach
Sarah answers calls and texts 24/7 with the latest on events, business hours, and neighborhood updates — no apps or logins required.
Promote What Matters
From grand openings to volunteer drives, Sarah shares what’s happening right now — helping you reach people fast, without extra effort.
Save Time, Sound Smart
Cut down on repetitive tasks and customer confusion. Sarah delivers clear, friendly info that makes your business or org look pro.
Getting Sarah and the Whole City to Show Up for You
Whether you need extra hands, more visibility, or just fewer interruptions, Sarah is ready. These quick-start options let you see her in action — no overthinking, no overwhelm. Just choose the role that helps you most, and let Sarah handle the rest.
Event Amplifier
Send your event details once. Sarah shares it with callers, texters, and anyone who asks, day or night. No extra posting or printing needed.
Business Wingwoman
When you're busy helping someone in person, Sarah takes the call. She answers common questions so people keep moving — right to your door.
Community Connector
Sarah collects local info as it happens and makes it easy for everyone to find. Help your org stay connected — and seen — without lifting a finger.
What Sarah Needs to Function
1. A small, curated knowledge base
Sarah needs access to:
A list of local businesses
A list of local services
Basic info pages (city services, county agencies, utility info, transit, etc.)
A few public URLs (websites, Google Docs, PDFs, schedules, menus, hours, etc.)
This is not “thousands of integrations.”
This is 50–200 meaningful items.
2. Publicly accessible information
Sarah can read:
Any URL you give it
Any PDF you upload
Any shared Google Doc
Any written summary
The system does not need deep technical integration. It needs content — the same kind of content people already look up manually.
3. Occasional updates
If a restaurant changes hours or a city program updates its website, you update the link or summary — the same way you would update a website or a printed directory. This is normal maintenance, not heavy tech labor.
4. A modest budget to operate
Hosting + AI processing + phone number + infrastructure =
$108 per month for six months.
That’s the ask.
No labor from the sponsoring group.
No ongoing work dumped onto volunteers.
5. A point of contact for community input
Monthly meetings already exist. That’s enough.
People can suggest additions or corrections at those meetings.
What Sarah Does NOT Require
1. No scraping of social media
Sarah cannot and does not need to scrape Facebook, Instagram, Yelp, TikTok, X, or anything requiring login.
This is outside the legal and technical scope — and unnecessary.
2. No automated integrations with thousands of sites
Sarah does not need:
API contracts
Custom engineering
Paid integrations
Bots crawling the internet
“Thousands of touchpoints”
That is a misunderstanding of how retrieval-based AI works.
3. No large volunteer labor force
No one at South Side CAN (or anywhere else) needs to:
Manually enter data
Maintain complex systems
Learn new technology
Manage dashboards
Scrape anything
Content curation is handled by the builder — not the sponsor.
4. No permanent technical staff
Once Sarah is set up, the system runs on its own.
Updates happen when needed — not daily.
5. No massive scope
This is not a citywide, countywide, state-level project.
This is hyperlocal, just for the South Side.
It’s intentionally built to be small and manageable.
Bottom Line
Sarah is not an engineering project.
Sarah is not a data-scraping project.
Sarah is not a technical-integration project.
Sarah is a community information project powered by simple, structured content.
If you can provide funding and show up to monthly meetings, Sarah does the rest.
Song One and Song Two!
Mark's slides for Dec 4 (ask for them in an email)
Speaking of stories, link to Catherine's Stories at The Moth
