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9b corp demonstrates Neighborhood Explorer, a public-data mapping tool for Tulsa neighborhoods
Summary
Carlos Moreno of 9b corp demonstrated Neighborhood Explorer, a mapping tool that assembles public datasets to examine neighborhood-level indicators such as labor force participation, median household income and social isolation metrics cited by the U.S. Surgeon General.
Carlos Moreno, a client advocate with 9b corp, presented Neighborhood Explorer, a publicly sourced data and mapping application he described as designed to help community stakeholders visualize local conditions and identify outcomes to guide investments.
Moreno said 9b corp is a certified B corporation and that Neighborhood Explorer collates public data — census, program and other public sources — so users can view statistics by census tract rather than broader geographies. “Public data is transparent. It holds institutions accountable,” Moreno said, adding that the tool shows sources for each metric and includes disaggregation by race, gender and other attributes.
Moreno said the platform was partly motivated by public-health research, noting a 2023 U.S. Surgeon General report that identified social isolation as a major health concern. He demonstrated how Neighborhood Explorer maps median household income and labor-force participation at the census-tract level around Apache and Peoria and said the tool lets analysts compare adjacent tracts and overlay age, race and other demographics.
Using Neighborhood Explorer, Moreno said users can shift from county-level figures to census tracts to identify differences within short distances. He provided an example in which median household incomes differed by more than $10,000 across adjacent census tracts. He said the platform can also show whether labor-force participation figures are per-capita and explained that labor-force participation in the tool follows the census definition of “people actively looking for work.”
Moreno described Neighborhood Explorer’s origins in civic-technology research and said 9b corp has pivoted from commissioned nonprofit research toward a software product available to nonprofits, community organizations and potential business and faith-based partners. He said funding has come from nonprofit research contracts, philanthropy and workshops, and that the company is pursuing library partnerships and broader stakeholder engagement to expand access.
Commissioners asked technical and demographic questions, including whether the tool uses ZIP codes or census tracts (Moreno: “Those are census tracts”), how the platform handles mixed or multiethnic neighborhoods, and whether data are updated regularly (Moreno: “It would show the statistic. It would show the source.”). Moreno said the company is collecting user feedback to improve demographic handling and privacy protections.
Moreno also reported that he ran the commission’s meeting minutes through a commercial AI (Google Gemini) to summarize commission priorities and used that as an example of how analytic tools can extract themes from public minutes; he cautioned listeners to treat AI results as a first pass. Commissioners noted interest in workshops and public library access; Moreno said he and his team have offered workshops and occasional office hours.
