Arizona
slipped seven places in the overall rankings
in 2004, mainly because the state made
no improvements in the categories of
law, accessibility and usability, while
other states moved forward in those areas. Arizona’s
strength is still its mandatory electronic
filing program.
Arizona
law requires candidates to file one campaign
finance report in non-election years
and two reports before an election. Candidates
must report detailed information, including
occupation and employer, about contributors
who give $25 or more. All expenditures,
regardless of amount, must be disclosed,
but subvendor information does not have
to be reported. A major weakness
in the state’s disclosure law is
that neither last-minute contributions
nor last-minute independent expenditures
must be reported until after an election. Electronic
filing is mandatory for all statewide and
legislative candidates in Arizona.
There
have been few changes in accessibility
of campaign finance data in Arizona in
the last year. The usefulness of
the contributions database on the Secretary
of State’s web site is limited by
the fact that it is not possible to conduct
a search on the amount, employer or zip
code fields. The web site still lacks
an expenditures database, and does not
offer data that can be sorted online or
downloaded. Furthermore, access to
paper disclosure records is hampered by
the requirement that one sign a Public
Records Request Act form before being allowed
to view the reports, something very few
states require.
The
Secretary of State’s web site
continues to be plagued by a number of
usability and terminology problems, which
again are reflected in the state’s
low usability testing score. For
example, information about the state’s
disclosure law is found through a link
called “campaign contributions and
expenses”; that is in fact the title
of the campaign finance law, but a link
such as “Arizona’s campaign
finance law” might be more indicative
of what is available there. Especially
considering the usability problems, the
lack of a “data history” document
(explaining exactly whose records are available
online, what data is removed from the Internet
display, what time period the data covers,)
is also a problem for those trying to access
and make sense of the campaign finance
records.
