Methods on monitoring and tracking officials in office during non-election years:
50 State Report
Start by pulling up our current statewide official’s roster in Admin
- “Search officials and candidates, Biography Section”
- “By Office Held” > “Statewide” > Select State > “Now”
- Simply cross reference our roster by visiting the Office’s official website. e.g: Alaska’s Attorney General
- If we do not have the current Official in office, make the necessary change. Confirm with the official's website or any .gov source if possible at that time. Media reports can help to provide useful context, as well as social media posts from the outgoing official.
- Log change in 50 State Report. Note: this is especially helpful if a successor has not been named. Circle back on a daily basis (provided time, priority).
- Pull up the State Board of Education website (link can be found in 50 State spreadsheet), and cross reference our roster to active members.
- Repeat this process for our State Judicial roster. Links to State Supreme Court justices can be found in the 50 State report.
- You may find all sorts of legislative happenings -- changes in leadership, calls for resignations by other representatives, changes in committee assignments. Be weary of old news, they inevitably show up regardless of your timeline-filter. Carefully sift through headlines for a few pages, or until the headlines become notably irrelevant.
Carroll Publishing
- Visit Carroll daily. If you find yourself on top of legislative changes, many of these updates will have already been made.
- Ballotpedia is another great resource, but do not rely on them as a primary source for updates (try to beat them to changes). State Legislative Vacancies, State Judicial Vacancies.
- Make necessary changes in admin, log any updates in the 50 State report.
Tracking Changes In Office:
Changes in office should generally be caught in your daily reading of Carroll Publishing News. Throughout the year, add any known vacancies, special elections, appointments, nominations, and resignations to your tracking sheets. Entire rosters should also be checked at various points in the year.
In your daily reading, you should also note if committee assignments or leadership positions have changed, if a candidate has been added or removed from a ballot, if someone's party affiliation has changed, if ballot laws have changed, if a new election is announced, if a new measure has been added to a ballot, or if voter registration laws have changed. Communicate this to the appropriate person.
Updating Lists of Current Officials:
This is done periodically to account for any changes in office we might have missed (such as resignations, special elections, appointments, and political party changes). You will want to look for the official rosters of officials and compare them to the listing of current officials we have. This is simply a check of the name/office/district/party. The fastest way to do this is probably through admin using the 'Office Held' search bar.
Updating Current Officials Upon Notification from Key Votes
As Key Votes enters state votes into the database, they will often times notice that a legislator is missing or that someone is in office that should not be. When they encounter this situation, they are instructed to email the Research Director or someone in the department and notify them of the discrepancy. If you are the recipient of such emails, follow the instructions below for adding and removing officials. It is helpful if Key Votes emails you the official's name, candidate ID, and a link to their office website if the official is being added.
- If you are being notified an official is no longer in office, Google the official's name, state, office, and date s/he resigned/left office.
- For example, "Representative Bill Smith Maryland resignation." You will want to look for a date the person actually left office and enter this in admin under the 'Offices' tab.
- This may also give you an indication as to how the vacancy is going to be filled (special election, appointment, etc.).
Roster Check Schedule: Updating Current Officials
Complete scheduled roster checks to make sure that the correct people are in every office.
Complete daily scans of Carroll Publishing to stay up-to-date with changes in office due to resignations, appointments, deaths, etc.
With that in mind, it is important to also understand the amount of time it takes to complete and organize each update. Head to the Profiles Scheduling page for a more in depth discussion on how to keep track of research schedules using tracking documents, as well as how to manage Carroll Publishing.
Related Pages:
Officials Party Changes and Redistricting
Updating Current Officials
Removing Someone From Office
Adding Someone Into Office Manually
Handling Duplicate Candidates
