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THE PUBLIC RECORD · ORGANISED · SOS.CITY · SOS.cityThe public record of every place, organised.

Type a question, a place, a dataset or an agency. We answer from the record first, with sources. When we can't, Claude looks further.

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Sources and Licences

SOS.city is a library, not the publisher. Every record we show comes from a public source, and every record links back to it.

How each record is labelled

Every record shows:

  • Publisher. The agency, utility or body that publishes it.
  • Original link. Go to the source for the official version. If there is ever a difference, the original wins.
  • Last checked. When our link checker last fetched it and whether it had changed. A check confirms the page is there. It doesn't confirm the agency's data is correct.
  • Verified. Shows one of three statuses:
  • "Opened": a person or our reviewer opened the page and confirmed it matches.
  • "Search only": we found it through an official search result but haven't opened it yet.
  • "Not checked": we haven't confirmed it yet, so treat it with care.
  • Reuse
  • Free to reuse: the source says the data is public domain or under an open licence.
  • Check terms: the source doesn't state a licence. We link to it, and you should read its terms before copying the data.
  • Link only: we point to the official page and never copy the data (for example, sex-offender registries, jail logs and booking photos).
  • Don't reuse: the source forbids reuse. We link only.

Common licences

  • US federal works are generally not protected by copyright (17 U.S.C. §105) and are free to reuse. Some federal pages include third-party material that is protected.
  • State and city open-data portals usually publish under an open licence or terms of use stated on each dataset. Many California and Los Angeles datasets are public domain or open. Check each one.
  • OpenStreetMap data is © OpenStreetMap contributors and available under the Open Database Licence (ODbL). If you use it, you must credit it and share any database you derive from it under the same licence. See openstreetmap.org/copyright.
  • Other countries' government data is often under an open government licence that requires attribution (for example the UK Open Government Licence or Creative Commons Attribution).

The City Standard

Every city page opens with the city's record: the same 23 core records, in the same order, for every city, so you always know where to look and what's missing.

  • Safety and emergencies: emergency alerts sign-up, crime data, and police, fire and EMS calls.
  • Power and water: the power outage map and the drinking water quality report.
  • Hazards: air quality.
  • Housing and buildings: building permits, code enforcement and building complaints, rent and tenant rules, eviction records, property assessment and deeds, and the zoning and parcel map.
  • Business: licensed businesses.
  • City services: 311 service requests.
  • Laws and government: the municipal code, and council agendas and decisions.
  • Money: the city budget, spending, payments and contracts, and grants you can apply for.
  • Streets: traffic crashes, and parking citations and meters.
  • Health: restaurant inspections.
  • Open data: the city's official open-data portal.

Where they apply, a city page also shows evacuation zones, earthquake and flood zones, short-term rental rules and street work.

Each row says one of five things:

  • Filed: the city publishes it, and we opened the page and checked it.
  • Covered: it comes from the county, the state or the country, and it covers the city.
  • No public source: we looked, and the city doesn't publish it. It goes on the gap board, with where we looked.
  • Being researched: we're looking for the official source now.
  • Not filed yet: we haven't found it yet. Ask for it and we'll go and get it.

A record counts only when it's the official publisher's own page and someone has opened it. We never guess a link to fill a row.

What's ours

The organisation, categories, descriptions, place mapping, check history, gap board and archive are SOS.city's work. You can use them under the Terms of Use and your plan. When you show SOS.city data, credit the original publisher and link to the original source. You can also add "via SOS.city".

No endorsement

A link to a source doesn't mean the source endorses SOS.city or that we endorse the source. Agency names and logos belong to their owners.

Spotted a problem?

Report a broken link, a wrong label or a source we're missing at support@sos.city, or use Request this data on any page. To remove or correct a record, see Removals and Corrections.