Follow the money
Learn how contributions, expenditures, loans, independent spending, and filing periods fit together.
Explore campaign financeLearn the system
Learn how to follow the records.
Public records become more useful when someone explains what they show, what they leave out, and how they connect to the decisions that affect your community.
Choose a starting point
Three ways into the paper trail.
You do not need to understand every form or institution at once. Start with the question you are trying to answer, then follow the connected records.
Understand an election
Connect an office or measure to its candidates, results, geography, reporting requirements, and source records.
Browse electionsKnow your government
See how counties, cities, districts, boards, and other public bodies relate to the places people live.
Explore a locationExplainers in development
Start with the forms behind the numbers.
The first learning series focuses on California campaign-finance records. Each guide will include a transcript, source links, annotated examples, and related pages.
Understand summary totals and the schedules for contributions, spending, loans, and accrued expenses.
Trace one contribution from an original filing to the related committee, entity, and election pages.
Learn the different purposes of Forms 496 and 497 and how later reports can overlap with them.
Recognize amendments, filing periods, incomplete records, and what a form cannot establish by itself.
Civic questions
The learning library will grow with the site.
Future explainers will cover the public bodies, documents, and processes that appear across election, location, candidate, and entity pages.
- Campaign finance: What is an independent expenditure, and who reports it?
- Public offices: What does a county supervisor do?
- Financial disclosures: What is a Form 700, and what does it disclose?
- Special districts: How does a focused local government work?
- Boards and commissions: Who appoints members, and what authority do they hold?
- Bills and proceedings: What happens in a legislative committee?
A consistent learning standard
Every guide should help you verify the lesson.
Educational material should not ask readers to trust a detached summary. It should identify the record, show the relevant evidence, explain the limits, and make the next question easier to pursue.
- Plain-language title and concise description
- Transcript and captions for video or audio
- Chapters or key questions when useful
- Named sources and original documents
- Related elections, entities, places, and records
- Publication date, update date, and correction path
Suggestions box
What do you want to learn about?
Tell us which form, office, election, public body, process, or civic question you would like us to explain in a future guide.
Future suggestions may be submitted anonymously.Learn by exploring
Start with a real public record.
Riverside County campaign-finance and election pages are available now. Open an election, follow a candidate or entity, and keep the original sources close as you go.