VTDigger.org, the online daily news site for Vermont policy and politics, today announced the launch of Vermont’s first Campaign Finance Database, which features complete lists of donations to candidates for Vermont House, Vermont Senate and statewide seats. The database covers the 2011-2012 and 2013-2014 election cycles, and offers information about how much Vermont candidates have raised across political campaigns and who the donors are.
“For the first time, and at no cost to taxpayers, users can easily search for donors and candidates by name, quickly retrieve aggregated totals, and explore business and family connections between donors,” VTDigger founder and editor Anne Galloway said.
Until now, Vermont was one of 12 states without a publicly owned, searchable database of contributions to political candidates and campaign expenditures.
The campaign finance reporting system currently in place at the Vermont Secretary of State’s Office is limited to a static presentation of individually signed and scanned PDFs of the original disclosure forms signed by campaign managers and PAC administrators, with no capacity to calculate totals by donor type, candidate or election cycle.
“Without investing many hours in the manual review of hundreds of spreadsheets and PDFs, it’s nearly impossible to figure out which contributors donate the most to politicians,” Galloway said. “Citizens can now easily learn about the money that drives politics in Vermont, including the PACs, lobbying and trade organizations, business and individuals who support particular candidates.”
VTDigger’s campaign finance database will expand in the coming weeks to include media expenditures, to provide information about how campaign money is allocated for television and radio advertising, including who the vendors are, and where they are located. It will also be expanded to include the 2009-10 election cycle.
VTDigger plans to integrate its data tables with new data provided by the Secretary of State’s Office going forward, providing Vermonters with the only tool for finding historic and aggregable results for election cycles beginning in 2009.
The nonprofit news organization developed the database with funding from the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation, the Lintilhac Foundation, and contributing readers.
