Lucy Burns Institute
The Lucy Burns Institute (LBI) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization based in Middleton, Wisconsin. It was founded in December 2006 and sponsors Ballotpedia. Since 2016, the Lucy Burns Institute conducts business using the name Ballotpedia.
About the Lucy Burns Institute
Mission
The mission of the Lucy Burns Institute is to serve our audience by providing curated content on all levels of U.S. politics that is relevant, reliable, and available for all. Informed voters are the foundation of democracy, and we envision an America where everyone has equal access to accurate information about politics, elections, and policy. With your help, we have created and continue to build Ballotpedia, the online encyclopedia of American politics and elections. With 556,679 original articles, Ballotpedia’s goal is to inform people about politics by providing accurate and objective information about politics at all levels of government. We are firmly committed to neutrality. Ballotpedia’s articles are 100 percent written by our professional staff. We thoroughly vet and carefully curate all information we publish, aggregating from news and government sources, down to the most obscure public record.
History
In late 2006, in an effort to gain a better understanding of local government activity, Wisconsin resident Leslie Graves filed a number of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. She encountered several roadblocks along the way, including a number of officials who ignored her FOIA requests. Frustrated with how difficult it was to learn more about her local government, Graves wondered if perhaps other citizens had experienced similar obstacles. Friends and family suggested that Graves create a resource devoted to helping citizens navigate the laws surrounding government transparency.
In December 2006, the Lucy Burns Institute was incorporated as a nonprofit organization in Madison, Wisconsin. In 2007, the Lucy Burns Institute launched WikiFOIA, a collaborative, crowd-sourced approach to understanding state-level FOIA laws. The goal of WikiFOIA was to harness local knowledge in an effort to empower citizens seeking information from governmental entities.
Later in 2007, inspired by the success of WikiFOIA, Graves started thinking about other areas of government that can be difficult to navigate due to a lack of easily accessible information. She came up with the idea for user-driven online platforms dedicated to sharing information about statewide and local ballot measures and the laws governing them; state and local recall elections and the laws governing them; federal and state court judges, their appointments and elections, and the intricate laws governing judicial selection; and state court judicial administration. Ballotpedia and Judgepedia were born.
Under LBI’s guidance, Ballotpedia has grown to include information on state legislators and state legislative elections; statewide executive officials and their elections and appointments; presidential elections; U.S. Congressional candidates and elections; school board candidates and elections; and city and municipal elections.
In March 2015, LBI merged its two flagship websites, Ballotpedia and Judgepedia. All pages on Judgepedia were transferred to Ballotpedia in order to provide readers with a more fluid, user-friendly experience (Press release: Ballotpedia to absorb Judgepedia).
LBI seeks to provide comprehensive coverage of the over 580,000 elected positions in the United States, as well as the laws that govern every kind of election. Our primary goal is solving the ballot information problem, empowering voters everywhere by offering candidate information all the way down the ballot.
The organization's namesake
The Institute is named in honor of Lucy Burns, a suffragette who helped to organize the National Woman’s Party in 1916. In her work to advocate the cause of “votes for women,” she organized, lobbied, wrote, edited, traveled, marched, spoke, rallied and picketed. When she was eventually arrested for her activities, she led a hunger strike in prison and was ultimately force-fed. She knew that being able to participate in a democracy by voting was an essential way to express our human dignity. For this goal, she was willing to fight and suffer.
In a small way, we like to think our work carries on the spirit of Lucy Burns. In modern America, the barriers to full participation in our democracy aren’t as concrete as the ability to cast a vote. What can prevent people from fully engaging in today’s political process are barriers to finding accurate, comprehensive information about election laws, politicians, candidates and elections. LBI’s goal is to help solve that problem for all three branches of government, at all three levels of government.
Annual reports
- 2023 Ballotpedia Annual Report
- 2022 Ballotpedia Annual Report
- 2021 Ballotpedia Annual Report
- 2020 Ballotpedia Annual Report
- 2019 Ballotpedia Annual Report
- 2018 Ballotpedia Annual Report
- 2017 Ballotpedia Annual Report
- 2016 Ballotpedia Annual Report
- 2015 Ballotpedia Annual Report
- 2014 Lucy Burns Institute Annual Report
- 2013 Lucy Burns Institute Annual Report
Funding
The Lucy Burns Institute/Ballotpedia is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit funded by donations from individuals and foundations. We also provide Premium Research Services; sell access to our election and political information (such as candidate lists, information about ballot measures, and more) via our API; and receive revenue through digital ad sales.
Governance
The Lucy Burns Institute is governed by a board of directors. The current members of the board are:
- Mike Barnhart, Chair
- Kristen Ansley
- Tim Dunn
- Leslie Graves
- Todd Graves
- Steven Nemerovski
- Ana Zablah-Monroe
- Jack McHugh, Board Member Emeritus
Contact
The Lucy Burns Institute can be reached via mail at the following address:
- 8383 Greenway Blvd.
- Suite 600
- Middleton, WI 53562
By email at info@lucyburns.org.
See also
External links
