While
its D+ grade might not indicate it on the surface, Oklahoma's
campaign finance disclosure program has the potential to
be much better. With a reinstatement of its mandatory
electronic filing rule and a few changes to its disclosure
law and web site, Oklahoma could climb closer to the top
in the study.
The
state's campaign finance disclosure law is above average and
requires active candidates to file quarterly reports every
year, plus an additional report each election. Candidates
must disclose details, including occupation and employer, about
contributors who give more than $50. Last-minute contributions
of $500 or more must be reported within 24 hours. All
expenditures must be disclosed, including detailed subvendor
information. Independent expenditures must be disclosed
as well, and last-minute independent expenditures of $500 or
more must be reported within 24 hours. Oklahoma once had
a mandatory electronic filing program, established by administrative
rule in 1997, but that rule was changed by an act of the
legislature and electronic filing is now voluntary.
Oklahoma
does a good job of making campaign finance data accessible
to the public. The strength of its disclosure web site
is that it contains searchable contribution and expenditure
databases. The
weakness is that those databases are populated with information
from electronically filed reports only, which, combined
with the change in the electronic filing rule, results in a
wealth of data from the 1998 election, but just a handful of
reports since then. Most reports are filed on paper
and are not scanned for the web. The paper reports are
only available on paper through the Oklahoma Ethics Commission's
offices. The
state's B grade in this category reflects the fact that
the foundation for providing online access to campaign
finance data is there — what the state needs to do next
is start filling in the structure with actual reports, and
it appears changes are already underway. Recently
the Ethics Commission unveiled a new system for electronic
filing of campaign finance reports; hopefully this will
result in a larger number of reports available for viewing
online.
Web
site usability is clearly the area in which Oklahoma
has the most room for improvement. The state's searchable
campaign finance databases were first developed in 1997 and problems
apparent from the beginning, although relatively minor, have not
been addressed. Case sensitive search fields and a search
results page that first lists every committee in the system before
returning any data, are just two examples of usability problems
for which there is a relatively simple fix. A lack of instructions
for using the system makes those and other technical difficulties
even more frustrating. Not surprisingly, Oklahoma's disclosure
web site failed the usability test. Contextual usability
could be improved with clearer terminology, the addition
of lists of the total amounts raised and spent by state candidates,
and a better explanation of exactly whose reports are on
the web site.
