Campaign Spending Commission Launches Interactive App

App Visualizes Wide Range of Hawaii Campaign Financial Data

From Transform Hawaii Government December, 2013

The Hawaii Campaign Spending Commission is shining a light on local politics by launching a web-based application that allows citizens to access a wide range of campaign financial data on any elected official in the state.

The "Data Visualization Application” was developed by the Campaign Spending Commission in partnership with the State of Hawaii's Office of Information Management and Technology (OIMT), the State's Information & Communication Services Division, and Socrata, which develops open data applications for local, state and federal government agencies nationwide.

Campaign spending data has long been accessible online, but the addition of a visualization tool has transformed tables of data into useful information that can help voters make more informed decisions, as well as identify any potential conflicts of interest.

For example, by selecting a candidate and an election period, citizens can view a pie chart of a candidate's contributions to see how much and what percentage of their contributions are from individuals, noncandidate committees, political parties, immediate family members, etc. Citizens can also see how much and what percentage of a candidate’s campaign funds are coming from within Hawaii or out-of-state.

Citizens can also clearly see where campaign funds are being spent. A pie chart shows the amount and percentage of a candidate's spending on expenses such as advertising, food & beverage, printing, professional services, voter research and more, as well as in-state versus out-of-state spending.

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