Today is my last day working at NAVTEQ\Nokia\HERE. I started at what was then NAVTEQ in October 2010 after spending 4 years working in Kankakee County GIS.

Over the last several years I’ve become more involved in the open government/open data/civic technology world (and of course the Chicago Public Schools community) and have worked on various open government and civic projects in my “free time.”

While I have loved working at NAVTEQ/HERE, it is clear from my Twitter feed that my passion is in the civic/government/non-profit/education world. With a full time job (mostly) outside of that space it has been difficult to devote as much time as I would like to learning both the technical and personal/community sides of it and to contributing to as many projects as I would like. So now I am starting my own company Kalov Strategies LLC where I hope to be able to work more with community organizations and civic data/development.

I’m very excited for my first project starting Monday. I will be working as a consultant with Smart Chicago Collaborative on expanding Cook County Government’s Open Data Initiative and open data releases through the Smart Chicago Collaborative – Cook County Partnership.