The State of Disclosure in Florida
Florida has been a consistent leader in campaign
disclosure and earned its fourth straight B+
and top five ranking in Grading State Disclosure
2008. Florida has earned As in both the
electronic filing and accessibility categories
in each assessment since 2004.
Florida
earned a B and ranked 13th in the Campaign
Disclosure Law category in 2008. The state
requires candidates to itemize contributions
over $100, including the donor’s name
and occupation, but not his or her employer.
Expenditure disclosure is stronger, with subvendor
and accrued expenditure disclosure required.
Independent expenditures are reported in Florida,
and those made at the last minute are disclosed
prior to Election Day. The law’s enforcement
provisions are also strong and include mandatory
desk reviews and field audits. Florida requires
all statewide and legislative candidates to
file disclosure reports electronically and
maintained its A+ and a number one ranking
in this area in 2008.
Florida
again earned an A in the Disclosure Content
Accessibility category and ranked 7th in
2008. The Department of State’s web
site features both browsable reports and searchable
databases of contributions and expenditures.
The databases contain records from 1996 to
present and include both electronic data and
paper-filed reports that have been data-entered
by agency staff. Database users can sort and
download itemized data, and can search campaign
donors by name and occupation, but not by employer
since candidates are not required to disclose
this information. As noted in previous studies,
disclosure reports are presented in a clean,
informative index, but this feature is somewhat
hidden by its placement outside of the main “Campaign
Finance” section of the site and this
issue remains despite a makeover of the site
in 2008. The index provides summary information
about campaign finances such as contributions,
loans, and expenditures for each filing period
and for the entire election cycle.
Online
Contextual and Technical Usability has been
Florida’s weakest area in each
of the Grading State Disclosure assessments.
Despite earning the same grade as 2007, Florida
tumbled twelve places in the usability rankings
as other states made improvements. As in 2007,
most of the usability testers found the terminology
on the site confusing, and most rated their
experience as below average. (Florida’s
disclosure site received a makeover after the
close of the assessment period in 2008.) The
site does offer some contextual information
that is very useful, including clear instructions
and explanations of the searchable databases,
and excellent tools for comparing campaign
finances between candidates. The site could
be improved by linking candidates’ full
reports to the campaign finance database, and
by labeling amended reports as such.
→ Quick
Fix: Make it easier to access
and view candidates’ full
reports by linking this information
to the section of the site currently
labeled “Campaign Finance”.
♦ Editor’s
Pick: The index of a
candidate’s
reports allows users to view, sort,
or download itemized transactions
from within a single report or across
multiple reports filed during a given
election cycle. View
image
Disclosure Agency: Department of State
Disclosure Web Site: http://www.dos.state.fl.us |