The software gap is real
Tyler Technologies and Munis are built for cities 50K+. OpenGov is mid-tier. CivicPlus is mostly websites. For towns under 25K, the gap between “enterprise” and “spreadsheets” is filled mostly with… spreadsheets.
Research project · We’re listening, not selling
Small cities are running on software built for somewhere else.
78% of US municipalities have fewer than 25,000 residents. Most are stuck choosing between enterprise platforms priced for cities ten times their size, or running Excel and paper because nothing in between exists. We’re investigating whether that gap is real — and whether anyone should build for it.
78%of US municipalities have under 25K residents
5–7software systems the typical small-town clerk juggles
30 minwhat we’re asking. And giving back.
The Hypothesis
What we think we’re seeing.
These come from desk research and conversations with people in adjacent fields. Tell us if we’re right or off-base.
One person does five jobs
The clerk does FOIA. Also licensing. Also council minutes. Possibly the budget. No software is built for that combination, so you stitch together five tools — none of which talks to the others.
Mobile is missing
Your DPW crew, code enforcement officer, parks staff — they’re in the field. Their software is on a desktop. Timesheets, work orders, citizen complaints all get logged hours later, if at all.
Transparency is a Friday job
The council wants real-time budget vs. actual. The auditor wants clean reconciliations. The local paper wants meeting agendas posted on time. Each of these is a real time cost without a purpose-built tool.
What We’re Trying to Figure Out
Three questions we’d ask you on the call.
No script. No slide deck. Just genuine curiosity about how your town actually runs.
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How are you actually doing things now?
Not what vendor websites say you do — what your actual Tuesday morning looks like. The real workflow, including the parts where you switch tools, ask someone for help, or just give up and use paper.
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Where does the work actually break down?
The 20% of tasks that consume 80% of your time. The recurring fires you’ve stopped trying to fix. The thing the auditor flagged that you can’t justify spending more on.
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If you could replace one piece of software tomorrow…
… what would it be, and what would you replace it with? Hypothetically. Even if you don’t have budget. We’re trying to learn what “real change” would actually look like.
Why Us
Where this is coming from.
VexOps is building operations software for service businesses — lawyers, agencies, consultants, freelancers — where the pattern is one person or a small team wearing five hats. We keep hearing the same pattern from small-town governments, and we’re trying to understand whether the platform we’re already building could serve that market without rebuilding it. Or whether municipal operations are their own beast and we should leave them alone.
We’re not selling you anything. We don’t have a municipal product to demo. We don’t have a pricing page for cities. We’re trying to figure out whether to build one, and the only honest way to do that is to talk to people who actually run small towns.
If the conversation leads somewhere, you’ll be the first to know. If it doesn’t, you’ll have spent 30 minutes telling someone about the parts of your job that nobody usually asks about — which, based on the conversations we’ve already had, is occasionally cathartic on its own.
What’s In It For You
Why give us 30 minutes.
A real conversation
30 minutes with someone who’s genuinely curious about what you do, not trying to close a deal. Bring complaints, anecdotes, questions, whatever.
What other towns are saying
A summary of patterns and outliers from the small-town clerks, finance directors, and managers we’ve talked to so far. Names anonymized.
First look at anything we build
If we end up building for this market, you’ll see it first. No obligation. You can ignore the email.
Honest software recommendations
Based on what you describe, we’ll tell you what to look at right now — competitors included — if it’s a better fit than waiting for us.
Schedule the Call
Tell us a bit about your town.
We’ll reach out within 48 hours to find a 30-minute window that works.
Schedule a 30-min research call
We’ll reach out within 48 hours to set up a time. No sales pitch — just a conversation.