Capstone Conversation by Jared Asch

The East Bay's best podcast, the Capstone Conversation hosted by Jared Asch. The show interviews political, government, and community leaders in Alameda, Contra Costa, & Solano Counties. This is your news about what's happening in your city and how as a region we are tackling big items like transit, climate challenges, and growing our economy.

Capstone Conversation by Jared Asch is a news podcast hosted by Jared Asch, with 134 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Jared Asch hosts Capstone Conversation by Jared Asch, a news show with 134 episodes published.

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  Episode #132

  How Startups Win in GovTech

  Jul 29, 202644 minS1

  Jared Asch and Josh Broward co-host a joint episode discussing how startups sell and scale in government (GovTech). Jared, a consultant helping cities and private companies with economic development, land use, and GovTech sales, and Josh, founder of Wisdom Partners and a leadership coach with a PhD in organizational leadership, emphasize that governments care less about product features and more about problem-solving, risk reduction, and accountability. They recommend early pilots—sometimes free or via conditional contracts tied to success metrics—to build case studies, de-risk adoption, and create internal champions who understand procurement realities. They outline fundraising stages (angel, pre-seed, seed, A and beyond) and note GovTech is hard to sell but sticky once adopted. Scaling advice includes targeting repeatable customer profiles, starting small (“minnows”) before “whales,” focusing geographically, and maintaining founder relationships post-sale. They also introduce Startup Walnut Creek, building an East Bay innovation hub focused on sports and health tech, with an October competition and partnerships with institutions and investors.

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  Episode #131

  Innovation in Local News: How Locunity is Informing Communities in the Bay Area

  Jul 22, 202633 minS1

  Host Jared Asch interviews Jonathan Bash, CEO of Locunity, about how local information is changing as Bay Area newspapers lost most of their journalists after private equity consolidation, creating gaps in coverage of councils, boards, and special districts. Bash explains how Locunity uses AI to download and transcribe public meeting videos, ingest agendas, and convert them into structured data that powers free city newsletters plus alerts, roundups, briefings, and reports with quotes tied to source video for “ground truth.” The platform helps residents, advocacy groups, government relations teams, and journalists quickly identify relevant issues across many jurisdictions and beats. They discuss shifting media habits, declining social media usefulness amid bots and AI content, and the rise of AI-driven information retrieval. Bash describes Locunity’s growth to about 120 Bay Area jurisdictions plus Louisville, its funding via mission-aligned angel investors, and plans to scale nationally.

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  Episode #130

  The Gift of Life: A Deep Dive into Organ Donation Advocacy

  Jul 15, 202636 minS1

  Host Jared Asch discusses organ donation—especially kidney transplants—in the Greater Bay Area with advocate Maggie Jacobs and caregiver Bob. Maggie shares how her husband, diagnosed in 2018 with FSGS, needed a kidney quickly due to 5–9 year deceased-donor waits in California; they found a living donor by widely sharing his story on social media (not directly asking for a kidney), and he is now thriving after a transplant. She later donated a kidney herself and explains dialysis burdens, plus paired exchange, swap/chain, and voucher programs, noting only about 1 in 20 questionnaire respondents may be viable donors. Bob describes his son Johnny’s renal failure discovered after dangerously high blood pressure, five years on dialysis, limits on work and travel, and efforts with CPMC/Sutter to find a donor while addressing heart and liver issues; he promotes CPMCKidneyDonor.org. They cite national need (about 90,000 waiting) and urge routine lab work because kidney disease is often caught late.

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  Capstone Conversation by Jared Asch

  AI Tools for Government Professionals: Transforming Local Governance with AI: A Conversation with Civic & Legislaide

  Jul 8, 202639 min

  Host Jared Asch discusses gov tech with Civic CEO John Kokot and Legislaide CEO Roger Lin on how AI can improve government efficiency without replacing workers. Kokot, a former Navy pilot and Capitol Hill staffer, explains Civic Revere, an integration-first platform that consolidates inbox, calendars, and other tools to triage constituent communications and service requests, route work, draft tailored responses, and provide internal natural-language search; he describes a 311 pilot in New York City to close the loop with residents and map issues like flooding. Lin describes Legislaide’s AI system to diagnose state-law changes against municipal codes, draft ordinance materials quickly, and track multi-department updates to reduce hidden noncompliance, liability, and lost revenue opportunities. They address data privacy, AI accuracy concerns, and growing government adoption

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  Episode #128

  Innovating Fire Safety: Technology's Role in Combating Wildfires

  Jun 17, 202642 minS1

  <p>Host Jared Asch discusses California’s summer fire season and how technology is changing wildfire preparedness, response, and recovery with Bowen Kyle (CTO/co-founder, Ladris) and Gadi Benjamini (co-founder, FireDome). Kyle describes Ladris software used by counties and cities for wildfire spread and evacuation simulations, planning documents like LHMPs and community wildfire protection plans, real-time decision support, and public communication; he cites Nevada County as an early partner and emphasizes year-round route and fuels-treatment prioritization. Benjamini explains FireDome’s autonomous, on-site hardware system for properties such as HOAs, vineyards, resorts, and utilities, using surveys, simulations, cameras, and “smart capsules” to deplo...

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