In the last several weeks, PR Watch and SourceWatch/Congresspedia readers have knocked out several collaborative citizen journalism projects, including identifying the party affiliations of members of Congress, tracking the activities of PR firms and getting the contact information for freshman members of Congress. Great work, everyone! Tens of thousands of people are tuning into the site every day and are benefiting from all your research.
This week’s collaborative reporting project is on the 2008 congressional elections. The Congresspedia staff editors will be kicking off a project soon to provide voters with comprehensive information on the congressional elections next year, including profiles on each candidate on the ballot in both the primary and general elections. More than 2/3 of the members of Congress hail from “safe” districts or states that overwhelmingly vote for one party, meaning that for most voters the primary election or caucus is the only way to hold them accountable. Before we get started on the profiles, however, we need to figure out when each state will be holding their primaries and when their ballots will be officially released. No one knows this better than you, the people who actually live there.
Please join us in helping your fellow citizens become educated voters by letting us know when those dates are. We’ve got an article set up on Congresspedia with spaces for every state. For many states we already found out which month they finalize their ballots, but we need to know the specific day and other information. You may need to dig around a bit on the websites of your state election authority or parties or even give them a call. If you do find any useful websites, please enter them under your state’s entry so other citizen journalists can utilize them later. Have fun:
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