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GOT A QUESTION?
Manzo is an intern at CJR.
After answering questions from some 200,000 callers between last March and November, including 34,000 calls on election day, what do the researchers at Project Vote Smart and its sister organization, the Reporter's Resource Center, do now? They answer more questions.
What sort of questions? Well, on all sorts of topics, from the voting records of public officials to population demographics, from state education programs to crime rates, from case summaries to Supreme Court decisions.
Carmen McCollum, a reporter from the News-Dispatch in Michigan City, Indiana, says a reporter can obtain accurate information on "almost anything" from the center. Jenny Cockerham, managing editor of the Mineral Wells, Texas, Index, says that her first call to the center was about last year's cable regulation bill, which passed in October. The center, she says, gave her a lot of information about the bill over the phone and by fax, and provided names and numbers of additional sources.
The Reporter's Resource Center operates under the auspices of Project Vote Smart, a branch of the Center for National Independence in Politics that was incorporated as a nonprofit organization in 1988 after discussions between politicians and campaign managers about distortions in political information available to the public. Among the founders were former U.S. senators Barry Goldwater, George McGovern, and William Proxmire. The Reporter's Research Center, based at Oregon State University, in Corvallis, started operations last March. Its staff includes political scientists, journalists, librarians, and student interns. During last year's campaign, the center put out The Reporter's Source Book, a guide filled with contact names and numbers, as well as articles about political and journalistic issues.
Fifty percent of the center's funding comes from annual membership fees of $ 35 and donations, the other half from foundations. Four staff members and a varying number of interns take phone questions from 7 A.M. to 5 P.M. PST Monday through Friday. (Hours are longer during election cycles.)
The number? 503-737-4000.
