A late start and a crowded field
I didn't plan to build software. I planned to run for office. I jumped into my race at the end of January 2026 — late, into a crowded field, against candidates who had been organizing for months. On paper, it wasn't supposed to be close.
Every dollar had to count
When you start late and start small, you can't outspend anyone. You can only out-organize them. So we got ruthless about efficiency: targeting the right doors, routing volunteers smartly, and making sure every dollar a supporter donated actually reached voters. By the end, our operation was efficient enough that we reached targeted voters an average of three times.
The result
We placed 3rd with 13% of the vote in a crowded field — after entering at the last minute. That result didn't come from a bigger budget. It came from being disciplined, targeted, and organized with the tools we built to run the ground game.
Why Politimate
After the race, it was clear the software that made the difference shouldn't disappear when the campaign ended. Other candidates — especially first-timers and underdogs running local races — deserve the same edge. That's why we started Politimate LLC and turned those tools into Canvass by Politimate: field organizing software for campaigns that need to do the most with the least.
Building novel tools isn't new for me
I've spent my career at the intersection of maps, data, and technology — turning hard spatial problems into products people actually use. At Esri, the global leader in geographic information systems, I pioneered indoor mapping and launched ArcGIS Indoors, bringing location intelligence inside buildings for enterprise customers. I later founded and directed Esri's innovation lab, where my job was to reliably turn emerging technology into novel solutions to real problems.
That path started even earlier — as an Army topographic officer during the shift from analog to digital mapmaking, and with formal training in architecture. The throughline has always been the same: understand the real business drivers, listen hard, and combine different worlds of experience into something genuinely new. As I put it in a 2021 profile in American Builders Quarterly, "we innovate more when we are able to overlap different worlds of experience."
Canvass by Politimate is that same discipline applied to campaigns: a reliable, well-engineered solution to a real problem I lived firsthand — built by someone who has shipped innovative mapping and location technology at scale.
— Patrick Wallis, Founder & CEO, Politimate LLC