MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Get to know your neighbor, and make your community better.

That’s the goal as the City of Memphis begins partnering with the social network Nextdoor, a private, free network for your neighborhood.

More than 290 neighborhoods are already using the website and smartphone app in Memphis.

“Unfortunately most of us don’t know our neighbors that well. It’s very common,” said Central Gardens resident John Alexander.

Alexander has been using Nextdoor for the past year.

The site allows neighbors to privately discuss everything from yard sales to safety concerns like break-ins all from their computer or smartphone.

On Thursday, Alexander was pleased to hear the City of Memphis announce they’re partnering with the site to help police and residents communicate better.

Here’s how it works.

You register your address with the site, and from there a police precinct in your area will be able to interact with you and relay news.

“It’s free information for the city that’s then going to translate into hopefully police being able to focus on areas they need to,” said Alexander.

“This is new to us so we’re gonna have to learn how people are communicating. We’re gonna have to make sure we do outreach and we go to where the people are,” said Interim Memphis Police Director Mike Rallings.

Nationally however there’s recently been some complaints of users racial profiling, but Robbie Turner with Nextdoor said the company is trying to stop it.

“We have been working with the City of Oakland, California with 100 black men, with neighbors for racial justice, and trying to understand what issues are and where they’ve happened,” she said.

She said they’re also developing a template to help users properly report suspicious activity.

There are some 1200 cities that have partnered with the site including Austin, Atlanta and Sacramento.

According to Turner, the City of Sacramento said they’ve seen results with the app.

You can sign up with your smartphone or the website Nextdoor.com.