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Indicator: 1
[Output]
Measurements in/of Meeting Records
| Type |
Actual |
| StartDate |
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| EndDate |
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| Transparency |
C- |
| Description |
There is lots of work to do before meeting records can be called transparent. We have one thing, the Congressional Record.
It is the authoritative record of what transpires on the House and Senate floors, but nothing similar reveals the content
of committee meetings. Those meeting records are produced after much delay- sometimes an incredibly long delay- by the committees
themselves. These records are obscure, not being published in ways that make
things easy for computers to find and to comprehend. The Congressional Record also doesn't have the machine-discoverable
publication or machine-readable structure that it could and should. Giving unique, consistent IDs in the Record to members
of Congress, to bills, and other regular subjects of this publication would go a long way to improving it. The same would
improve transcripts of committee meetings. Another form of meeting record exists: videos. These have yet to
be standardized, organized, and published in a reliable and uniform way, though the HouseLive site is a significant
step in the right direction. Real-time flagging of members and key subjects of debate in the video stream would be a great
improvement in transparency. Setting video and video meta-data standards for use by both Houses of Congress, by committees,
and by subcommittees would improve things dramatically.
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