Campaign Contributions
| Item | Description |
|---|---|
| Current Status | Formal Discussion |
| Potential Implementing Agencies | Local, State and Federal Election and Campaign Monitoring Agencies |
| Potential Founding/Sponsoring Organizations | Sunlight Foundation |
Analysis -- Future Potential and Adoption
Some effort has been made to promote the disclosure of campaign finance contributions as well as the creation of databases of this information but no formal standard exists.Because of the way address and other affiliation data is maintained by different states, it is incredibly difficult to use this valuable information across geographic regions and years.Due to the lack of standardized publication, organizations such as the Sunlight Foundation, MapLight, and the National Center for Money in State Politics make enormous investments in cleaning data before it can be used.
However, the Sunlight Foundation has made substantial efforts to compile this data at the state and national level and make it available through a single download.More progress is needed to develop and encourage adoption of an open and universal standard.
Additional Resources
- National Institute on Money in State Politics - http://beta.followthemoney.org/
- MapLight - http://maplight.org/
- Open Secrets - http://www.opensecrets.org/news/disclosure.php