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Twenty Quality Benchmarks for Election Transparency
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| Select a state from the menu below to learn more about its election administration. |
Election administration responsibilities in the United States are distributed between the federal, state, and local governments.
Most election responsibilities are performed by state and local officials. Depending on the responsibility, type of office, or state, different government agencies will administer different elements of an election. For example, candidates for local elections in some states file campaign finance reports with a county clerk, while candidates for the same type of office in a different region may file with a state ethics commission.[1]
Election administrators at all levels of government have many responsibilities and face difficult challenges. These include registering voters, verifying petition signatures, maintaining voting equipment, preventing fraud, processing campaign finance reports, mailing absentee ballots, running polling places, counting votes, and more.[2]
One key responsibility for election administrators is to distribute information about elections to the public. Civic information organizations, including Ballotpedia, rely on transparency from election administrators. Greater election transparency and information availability enables greater public participation in the political process.
Benchmarks
Here are 20 quality benchmarks for election transparency:
- All data is compiled and published at the state level, including for local offices. Direct navigation is provided to federal election resources online.
- All data is located directly on the state website as well as in the downloadable comma-separated values (CSV) files used by spreadsheets and databases.
- All data is saved on permanent and unique website addresses, instead of on temporary pages where the old content is deleted, replaced, or moved over time.
- Election calendars are published at least two years in advance.
- Election calendars include the list of all offices that will be on the ballot for each election date.
- Election calendars include whether an office uses a convention system rather than a primary system to nominate candidates for the general election.
- Election calendars include independent and minor-party filing deadline and election dates, if they differ from the major-party dates.
- Election calendars include voter registration, absentee ballot, early voting, vote total certification, and swearing-in dates.
- Election calendars state whether runoffs or automatic recounts are possible and what the rules are for when one will be called.
- Election calendars state whether the primary will be canceled if not enough candidates filed to run to meet a certain threshold or if the general election will be canceled if a candidate in the primary meets a certain vote percentage threshold.
- Election calendars state the filing requirements for each type of office or ballot measures, if applicable.
- Candidate lists are searchable and sortable, including the option to list all of them at once.
- Candidate lists mark candidates as withdrawn or disqualified instead of those names being removed from the list without announcement or explanation.
- Candidate lists include an email address, phone number, and mailing address for each candidate who provides them.
- Candidate lists mark the incumbent officeholders as such and denote which offices have term limits.
- Candidate lists state whether a multi-seat office has statutory limits on how many members can be from one political party.
- Election results are searchable and sortable, including the option to list all of them at once.
- Election results include the percentage of precincts fully reporting for each race, a timestamp for when the results were last updated, and a clear marker upon their final certification.
- Election results webpages do not auto-scroll, auto-refresh, or require subscription to a mailing list to access.
- Campaign finance figures for each candidate, including their current cash-on-hand and total revenue/expenditures aggregated across all reporting periods, are published online and can be sorted by candidate or office.
Other desirable features
Besides the 20 quality benchmarks, here are some additional features to facilitate transparency and interoperability.
- Candidate lists, or other easily accessible materials, explain which offices compete in partisan vs. nonpartisan primaries, if applicable.
- GIS information / shape files for all election districts
- Push notifications to a signup distribution list when selected types of changes are made
- Additional election and office information such as the election contest vote for # and terms of office.
- Use of industry standard common data formats such as OCD IDs and the NIST 1500-100r2 Specification
Are there other benchmarks for election transparency that you believe belong on the list? Email us with your nominations!
See also
External links
- Federal Election Commission
- U.S. Election Assistance Commission
- The National Association of State Election Directors
- The National Association of Secretaries of State
- The National Association of Election Officials
Footnotes
