mereditharmcgee · mereditharmcgee · Aug 29, 2026 · Aug 29, 2026 · Aug 29, 2026
diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
@@ -46,3 +46,8 @@ playwright/.auth/
 # personal documents kept alongside the repo, not part of the app
 Org Docs/
 just-tech-application/
+
+# non-code working files that name individuals or record private conversations
+# (see ops/AGENTS.md — this is a safety rule, not tidiness)
+ops/private/*
+!ops/private/README.md
diff --git a/AGENTS.md b/AGENTS.md
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@ Directory-specific rules live in nested `AGENTS.md` files and override this one
 | [`src/lib/AGENTS.md`](src/lib/AGENTS.md) | Scoring, survey items, validation — the load-bearing logic |
 | [`src/components/AGENTS.md`](src/components/AGENTS.md) | Astro vs React, brand tokens, islands |
 | [`migrations/AGENTS.md`](migrations/AGENTS.md) | Schema changes and the production migration trap |
+| [`ops/AGENTS.md`](ops/AGENTS.md) | Non-code work: growth, funding, partnerships, content |
 
 > **Never put an `AGENTS.md` (or any `.md`) inside `src/pages/`.** Astro's file-based
 > routing turns Markdown in `src/pages/` into a public page — a guide at
@@ -82,6 +83,7 @@ npm test -- scoring   # filter by name
 npm run build      # production build
 npm run e2e        # fresh local D1 + seed + build + Playwright
 npm run db:setup   # db:fresh then db:seed (local D1 only)
+npm run ops:metrics   # regenerate ops/METRICS.md from production (read-only)
 ```
 
 `npm run smoke` has no default target. Supply an explicit `--environment` and

diff --git a/ops/AGENTS.md b/ops/AGENTS.md
@@ -0,0 +1,72 @@
+# `ops/` — Non-Code Work
+
+Growth, funding, partnerships, and content. `.planning/` is engineering milestones; this is
+everything else. Start at [`README.md`](README.md).
+
+---
+
+## Hard rules
+
+**1. Never write a named individual into a tracked file.**
+
+Organizations, yes. People, no. No names, no email addresses, no "she said," no notes from
+a private conversation. Those go in `ops/private/`, which is gitignored.
+
+This is a safety rule, not a style preference. RateMyPlace's first non-negotiable is
+protecting people from retaliation, and the tenant organizers and legal aid staff who help
+the project are covered by the same logic as reviewers. If you are drafting outreach
+content and need a placeholder, write the role: "the tenant union's organizing lead."
+
+**2. Never hand-type a number that can be queried.**
+
+`ops/METRICS.md` is generated by `scripts/ops-metrics.ts` from the production database.
+Do not edit it. Do not copy its figures into other files either — link to it. A number
+copied into prose is a number that will be wrong within a month, and wrong numbers in a
+grant application are worse than absent ones.
+
+If you need a figure that the script doesn't produce, add it to the script.
+
+**3. Aspiration and fact are labeled, always.**
+
+`MASTER.md` spent months describing fraud controls, velocity alerts, and honeypots that
+were never built, because nobody separated the plan from the state. It now uses a
+**Built today / Planned** split. Use the same discipline here: a channel that was *tried*
+reads differently from one that was *considered*.
+
+**4. Voice: no em dashes.**
+
+`brand.md` v1.4 removed em dashes throughout for consistency with the brand bible. Anything
+here that could become public copy follows that. Use commas, colons, or a full stop.
+
+See [`content/MESSAGES.md`](content/MESSAGES.md) for approved language, and `brand.md` §2
+for the full voice guidance.
+
+## When updating a file
+
+- Update the `Last reviewed:` date. If you didn't verify it, don't touch the date.
+- Record outcomes, not intentions. "Emailed three tenant unions, one replied, meeting set"
+  is useful. "Plan to reach out to tenant unions" ages into noise.
+- Failures are the valuable entries. A channel that didn't work saves the next person
+  the attempt, and it is the thing nobody writes down.
+
+## Where the truth lives
+
+| Question | Source of truth |
+|---|---|
+| How many reviews, buildings, landlords? | `ops/METRICS.md` (generated) |
+| What does the product actually do? | `MASTER.md` — Built today / Planned split |
+| How do we talk about it? | `brand.md` §2, then `ops/content/MESSAGES.md` |
+| What is the scoring methodology? | `src/lib/scoring.ts`, published at `/methodology` |
+| What is the engineering state? | `.planning/`, then `git log` |
+
+When a document and the code disagree, **the code wins** — root `AGENTS.md` says so, and it
+has been right every time it came up.
+
+## Don't
+
+- Don't promise capability the product doesn't have. Every claim in outreach or a grant
+  narrative must be checkable against `MASTER.md`'s Built section or `ops/METRICS.md`.
+- Don't overstate the health weighting. Its real-world effect on scores is under 0.1 in
+  practice. Saying otherwise is the exact overselling this project exists to avoid.
+- Don't create a tracking file for work that isn't happening. An empty template is worse
+  than nothing; it looks like a system and holds no information.
diff --git a/ops/METRICS.md b/ops/METRICS.md
@@ -0,0 +1,55 @@
+# Metrics
+
+**Generated 2026-08-29 from the production database.** Do not edit by hand — run:
+
+```bash
+npx tsx scripts/ops-metrics.ts
+```
+
+Read-only. Every query is a SELECT.
+
+## The number that matters
+
+**53 approved reviews.**
+
+Everything else in [growth/](growth/STRATEGY.md) exists to move this. The site is
+methodologically sound and technically healthy; it is thin on evidence.
+
+## Coverage
+
+| Measure | Count |
+|---|---|
+| Approved reviews | 53 |
+| Pending review queue | 0 |
+| Verified reviews (proof of address) | 15 |
+| Buildings in database | 91 |
+| Buildings with at least one review | 51 |
+| Buildings with no review yet | 40 |
+| Landlords | 27 |
+| Property managers | 0 |
+| Disputes filed | 0 |
+
+51 of 91 buildings carry a review. A search that returns an
+empty building is a visitor who leaves.
+
+## Landlord score coverage
+
+A landlord aggregate is withheld below 3 approved reviews, so a
+named party is never scored on thin evidence.
+
+| Approved reviews | Landlords | Score |
+|---|---|---|
+| 1 | 21 | withheld |
+| 2 | 4 | withheld |
+| 4 | 1 | shown |
+| 5 | 1 | shown |
+
+**2 landlords currently show a score. 25 are withheld.**
+
+This is the clearest statement of the constraint. The threshold is a deliberate fairness
+choice, not a bug — but it means landlord pages only become useful with volume.
+
+---
+
+*Regenerated by `scripts/ops-metrics.ts`. If this file's date is old, the numbers are
+old — rerun it before quoting any figure in a grant application, a pitch, or a post.*
diff --git a/ops/README.md b/ops/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,61 @@
+# ops/ — the non-code work
+
+Everything RateMyPlace needs that isn't source code: getting reviews, funding the work,
+building relationships, and saying what the project is.
+
+`.planning/` tracks engineering milestones. This tracks everything else.
+
+## Why this exists
+
+The site is technically healthy and methodologically sound. It is thin on evidence:
+**53 approved reviews**, and only 2 of 27 landlords clear the three-review threshold
+required to show a score. No code change fixes that. This directory is where that work
+lives.
+
+## What's here
+
+| Path | Holds | Refresh |
+|---|---|---|
+| [`METRICS.md`](METRICS.md) | The real numbers, straight from production | **Generated** — never edit by hand |
+| [`growth/`](growth/STRATEGY.md) | Getting reviews. The priority. | When something is tried or learned |
+| [`funding/`](funding/PIPELINE.md) | Opportunities, deadlines, reusable narrative | When a deadline moves or a piece of prose proves itself |
+| [`partners/`](partners/LANDSCAPE.md) | Organizations and the landscape | When the map changes |
+| [`content/`](content/MESSAGES.md) | Approved language and talking points | When a message is tested |
+| `private/` | Named individuals, private conversations, funder feedback | **Gitignored. Never tracked.** |
+
+## The privacy rule
+
+**Named individuals and private conversations go in `private/`, which is gitignored.**
+
+This is not bureaucratic. RateMyPlace's first non-negotiable is that people who talk to it
+should not face retaliation, and that extends past reviewers to the tenant organizers,
+legal aid staff, and city contacts who help. A public list of who spoke to you and what
+they said is exactly the artifact this project exists to argue against.
+
+Tracked files may name **organizations**. They may not name **individuals**, quote private
+conversations, or record what someone said off the record.
+
+## Keeping it current
+
+Every file carries a `Last reviewed:` date. That is a claim, and it can be wrong.
+
+Two rules, both learned the hard way in this repo — `VERSION.md` sat frozen at
+v1.1.0-alpha for seven months, and `MASTER.md` described fraud controls that were never
+built:
+
+1. **Numbers are generated, never typed.** Anything countable comes from
+   `npx tsx scripts/ops-metrics.ts`. If you find yourself typing a figure into a document,
+   it will be wrong within a month.
+2. **When a document and reality disagree, reality wins** — and the document gets fixed in
+   the same sitting, not added to a list.
+
+Agents maintaining these files: read [`AGENTS.md`](AGENTS.md) in this directory first.
+
+## Refreshing the numbers
+
+```bash
+npx tsx scripts/ops-metrics.ts
+```
+
+Read-only against production. Run it before quoting any figure in an application, a pitch,
+or a post.
diff --git a/ops/content/MESSAGES.md b/ops/content/MESSAGES.md
@@ -0,0 +1,106 @@
+# Messages
+
+**Last reviewed:** 2026-08-29
+
+Approved language. Voice rules come from `brand.md` §2; this is where they get applied to
+specific recurring situations.
+
+**Voice rules that apply to everything below:**
+
+- **No em dashes.** `brand.md` v1.4 removed them for consistency with the brand bible.
+  Use commas, colons, or a full stop.
+- Plain, direct, civic. Specific over clever. Active voice.
+- Write from the tenant's side of the screen.
+- No urgency, no marketing register, nothing that sounds like a startup pitch.
+- Credibility comes from restraint and from showing the work.
+
+## The canonical line
+
+> **A public record of rental housing, from the people who know it best.**
+
+This is the primary message, from the brand bible. Do not paraphrase it into something
+punchier. The shorter variant "a public record for renters" is retired as a primary line
+and survives only as a mid-sentence descriptor.
+
+## Positioning, when someone asks what it is
+
+> We are not Yelp for apartments. We are closer to a public health department with a
+> comment section.
+
+Useful because it does two jobs at once: it sets the frame and it heads off the comparison
+everyone reaches for first.
+
+## The ask, to a prospective reviewer
+
+Lead with the next tenant, not with civic good. A review does not help the person writing
+it, and pretending otherwise is transparent.
+
+> Your review will not help you. You already know what living there was like. It will help
+> the person standing in that apartment next year deciding whether to sign.
+
+Follow with the honest cost: it is a 32-item survey and takes real time. Do not soften
+that. People who are told it is quick and find it is not will abandon it, and abandoned
+reviews are worse than declined ones.
+
+## On anonymity, which is the first question every time
+
+> Reviews are anonymous. We collect exact dates so the data is useful, and we never display
+> them: the site shows a season and a year, or a range like "1 to 3 years ago." Your name
+> is never shown. Reviews are moderated before publication, and landlords can dispute a
+> review through a formal process, but a review is never removed because a landlord
+> disagrees with it.
+
+Every clause here is true and checkable. Do not add reassurance beyond it.
+
+**Do not say "we don't store IP addresses."** It is not accurate. Reviewer IPs are never
+stored, but IPs are persisted for rate limiting and in admin audit logs. If pressed, say
+exactly that.
+
+## On methodology, when credibility is the question
+
+> The survey is adapted from three validated public health instruments rather than
+> invented: the Observational Housing Quality Scale, the Physical Housing Quality Scale,
+> and the WHO LARES study. Every item, every weight, and every citation is published at
+> ratemyplace.org/methodology, including worked examples on real reviews. You can check
+> our work.
+
+The methodology page is the strongest asset the project has. Point at it early and often.
+
+## On the health weighting, carefully
+
+Health and safety items carry more weight: pests and mold at 1.5x, structural and climate
+at 1.3x, plumbing and building security at 1.2x.
+
+**Do not overstate the effect.** On real data the weighting shifts scores by less than 0.1
+in practice. If asked directly:
+
+> The weighting reflects which conditions the research says matter most for health. On our
+> current dataset it moves scores only slightly. We publish the formula and the worked
+> examples so anyone can see exactly how much it does.
+
+Overselling this is the precise failure the project's own ethics forbid.
+
+## On the size of the dataset
+
+Do not hide it and do not apologize for it.
+
+> The site is early. It holds [N approved reviews — see ../METRICS.md] across Boston and
+> New Haven, and most landlords do not yet have enough reviews to show a portfolio score.
+> We withhold a landlord's score below three reviews rather than publish a number based on
+> one person's experience.
+
+The withholding rule is a strength worth stating. It says the project would rather show
+nothing than something unfair, which is the opposite of what people expect from a review
+site.
+
+**Never hard-code the count.** Run `npx tsx scripts/ops-metrics.ts` and fill it at use time.
+
+## Things not to say
+
+| Don't | Because |
+|---|---|
+| "We don't store IP addresses" | Not accurate. See above. |
+| "Verified reviews" as a headline claim | Only some are. Unverified reviews are simply unbadged, never labeled unverified. |
+| Anything implying we solve affordability | Explicitly out of scope, and claiming it undermines everything else. |
+| "Rate My Professor for landlords" | Invites the consumer-review frame the project is built against. |
+| Any number not freshly generated | See METRICS.md. |