Draft the single election, multi-candidate view

[noahmanger]

Goal: Create a draft mockup for how the user can look at all candidates in a single race and compare key data points.

Steps:

• [x] Create 2-3 options
• [x] Get feedback from the team
• [x] Get feedback from a user

Size: Large

[noahmanger]

Here's one stab at this page. Here's the idea:

Each page is actually a "district" page. So for house, it will be the actual HD, for Senate, the entire state, and for president, well, the whole country. You can toggle two-year periods like with the candidate pages, but the tabs here actually are for different elections (general, primary, special). As I'm writing this I'm realizing it probably makes sense to split out each party's primary elections onto their own tab, but you get the idea.

My thought behind organizing it this way is that it makes it easy for a user to target by geography, and then narrow down and flip between the different "stages" of an election year. (

Each election tab, then, lists the candidates participating (with links to the candidate, pccc pages, as well as candidacy filings), top-level summary data, and then comparison data between all participating entities.

This last piece, the comparison, is tricky, as there will be a very wide range of participating groups. I had a version with multiple graphs, just like the candidate page, but it was feeling overwhelming, so trying something new here: a bar chart with the ability to turn on and off different entities and data-types (receipts, disbursements, cash, debt).

And then the user could also toggle between the graph view or a table view.

Curious what everyone thinks. Is this level of customization on the comparison overwhelming?

[LindsayYoung]

I like the overall design. Here are my thoughts:

I think the tabs for the different types of elections works well. We may want some type of grand total tab as well. (Most districts will not have a special election so it would be 4 tabs max.)

The Statement of candidacy is not that interesting, maybe we could have party instead?

We might want to restrict the financial Comparison to the primary committees to make an apples to apples comparison. The other groups may be involved in many other races.

I also like the links to the other races that represent the same area but I am not sure about listing the near-by ones.

[noahmanger]

Question I just thought of for the @LindsayYoung and @catherinedevlin : is it possible at all to distinguish which election a transaction is tied to? Is it just the date? Can we tell the difference between money spent for a general election vs. primary?

[noahmanger]

Oh, and @LindsayYoung re: your feedback:

• I'll think about a grand total tab
• I'll add part to the candidate list, but I think it's important to have the filings, that way users can check their district and easily pull up the filings for all candidates, no?
• I'll rephrase the "nearby races" to be "Races in your state"
• Good point on apples to apples comparisons... I'll think of alternatives

[noahmanger]

Update on this: what if the "committee type" controls for the chart were radio buttons instead of checkboxes, so you could only compare one type at a time?

If Outside Groups was shown, we could limit the "Metrics" to ones relevant (so maybe just Spending in the District).

[noahmanger]

Here's a different, simpler take. This one only presents the data as tables, as well as combines the candidate list at the top with the actual table of financial totals.

I could imagine a variation on this one where each of the main headings (Financial Summary, Candidates, Outside Spending, Electioneering Comms) was actually its own tab, instead of the Elections, and then have the ability to filter by Election within any one of those tables. That one might actually be easier to mockup in code, so I won't worry about a mockup right now.

[LindsayYoung]

Sorry, I fell behind on this conversation.

To clarify, I think that filings from the groups should be accessible, but highlighting the statement of candidacy in particular didn't make sense since it is not interesting. Perhaps a link to all filings for the committee?

I have not had a problem separating primary and general spending in the past. They need to keep track of that because contribution limits are tied to elections.

The name "nearby districts" is fine, it is just figuring out nearby districts doesn't sound fun. The numbers are not in a sane order. Here is a map for Texas Knowing which ones to list would take some research or mapping logic. (Though, there may be an easy way to do it that I don't know of.)

Perhaps, we could have a map where you could click on a point and it would take you to the district page?

[noahmanger]

Cool. I like the idea of linking to all filings for the committee. I made that change.

I think we might as well be explicit and say "Other districts in your state" and just list them all. It'll be a pain in a few states (california) but should be easy enough.

I've imagined some sort of map-based navigation at some point, but we're not there yet.

Does anyone have initial leanings one way or the other between the two big directions presented here?

[noahmanger]

Need more feedback but in the way that i need more feedback on everything, but this should be good to get into code.