Six seats on the 13-member IRE Board of Directors are up for election. The election will be held June 22 at the IRE annual conference in San Antonio, Texas.  Ten members have declared their candidacy in time to be put on the Absentee Ballots. You may view the candidate statements at http://ire.org/about/board-directors/elections/candidates/

Online absentee voting is available ONLY to current members (membership expiration date must be 7/1/13 or later) who are NOT attending the IRE conference in San Antonio.  Registration for the conference will void your absentee ballot!

Reminder – Voting is restricted ...

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We are now accepting applications for candidates for the IRE Board of Directors. Below you'll find an article written for the current IRE Journal by Board member Sarah Cohen explaining more about what it means to serve on IRE's Board, and details on how to file. If you have questions, you can contact me at mark@ire.org. If you're interested in running, make sure you get your name to John by May 3 to make sure you're on the first absentee ballots.  Submit your declaration of candidacy to IRE membership coordinator John Green at jgreen ...

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Claims of rampant election fraud are the stated reasons that 37 state legislatures have passed or considered voter identification laws since 2010. But opponents counter that such laws would keep far more poor, minority, elderly and student voters away from the polls than they would stop illegal voters.

The News21 team decided that hard data was needed to report on this highly partisan national debate regarding whether voter fraud is affecting elections, and whether fraud could be prevented by these new laws.

As part of the News21 national investigation into voting rights in America, we took on the unprecedented task ...

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Jack Gillum of The Associated Press recently published a story showing that vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan has relied on many of the programs he's criticized and suggested cutting. The report wouldn't have been possible without tools like DocumentCloud and Overview, Gillum said in a post on the Overview project's website. DocumentCloud enabled Gillum to analyze, annotate and publish large volumes of documents. Overview allowed him to sort the documents into topics and visualize their contents.

In all, there more were that 9,000 pages of material to review.  Using Document Cloud in concert with Overview helped Gillum ...

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Mother Jones magazine shook up the presidential campaign on Monday when it released a video it obtained of Republican candidate Mitt Romney speaking at a private fundraiser. The  video included the following comment from Romney, which many have taken issue with:

"There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food ...

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IRE is bringing its Election Watchdog Workshop to Columbus, OH on August 24-25. Arm yourself with the knowledge you need to cover the 2012 elections. Get in-depth tips and strategies to follow the campaign cash as well as help your audience track the behind-the-scenes battle for influence, backgrounding candidates, making sense of the new world of super-PACs and "independent" nonprofit advocacy groups and much more.
 For a schedule and additional information including registration details, please visit our website at http://ire.org/events-and-training/event/520/  

Seven seats up for election on IRE board

The filing period has begun for those planning to run for the IRE board of directors. Seven seats on the 13-member board are up for election. The election will be held June 16 at the IRE annual conference in Boston.

The IRE board serves as the governing body of IRE and generally meets in person twice a year to discuss and vote on IRE business. One meeting is at the annual conference in June. The board periodically has conference calls. Directors serve on committees and task forces made up of board members ...

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By Mayra Cruz
@MayraC27

News stories can be deepened through data, said speakers in the "Using data journalism to investigate the news" panel. 

“News happens fast,” Arizona Daily Star Rob O’Dell reporter said.

From tracking crime to finance, incorporating data in journalism goes beyond daily reporting and anecdotal information. 

Adding visualizations, numbers and maps allow the public to understand a story better.

Mortgage meltdowns in Arizona led O’Dell to look through data and map the areas where most of the foreclosed homes were being auctioned.

O’Dell also mentioned the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in 2011, in ...

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My news organization, Texas Watchdog, found thousands of dead people on our local county's voter rolls and dozens whose names may have been used to cast ballots after their deaths. We couldn't have conducted the investigation without the IRE and NICAR Boot Camp training in Columbia, Mo. Our story prompted local officials to remove two voters from the rolls whose names were used to vote after their deaths, and the story generated interest on the Drudge Report and Instapundit Web sites. Officials in Harris County, which encompasses Houston, have promised to meet with us post-election and have pledged ...

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Early this past fall, our group of journalists and developers at The New York Times began to assemble the data necessary to produce our election guide, which would not only focus on the presidential race but also include races for the U.S. House and Senate. Getting information about political candidates was a bit tricky given that we wanted to make sure we had details for viable candidates where they existed. We turned to Project Vote Smart, which not only has been compiling such data for years but also recently released an API, or application programming interface, that makes accessing ... Read more ...