Ballotpedia:Our methodology on original summaries of ballot measures
This page describes Ballotpedia's approach to providing original summaries for ballot measures.
Guiding principles
Ballotpedia provides original analyses of what each ballot measure would do if approved. The level of detail in these summaries varies and comes in the following formats:
- Ballotpedia's original article titles
- Summaries of what a "yes" vote accomplishes and what a "no" accomplishes
- One sentence summaries in charts on hub pages
- An overview summary on each ballot measure article
- An in-depth and detailed section on ballot measure articles that require it that is dedicated to explaining in detail the provisions found in the legal text of the measure
For statewide ballot measures, Ballotpedia staff rely solely on the full legal text of each ballot measure as the primary source for summaries. Guidance is sometimes taken from secondary sources such as the ballot language (ballot title/question and summary); voter information guide summaries; legislative analyst summaries; official analyses or opinions from attorneys general; fiscal analyses provided by state officials; statements or summaries by measure sponsors; analyses by third parties; and statements from supporters and opponents. But these secondary sources are used only to understand context and intention, and Ballotpedia's summaries are always controlled by the full legal text.
If a proposed constitutional amendment has implementing legislation passed prior to the election, Ballotpedia's summary can, at times, also look at the details found in the implementing legislation since that law helps understand how exactly the proposed constitutional amendment will be implemented.
For local ballot measures, depending on the availability of resources, a combination of the ballot language and the full text are used as primary sources.
If you encounter a title or summary of a ballot measure on Ballotpedia that is inaccurate or biased, please email editor@ballotpedia.org.
Specific policies
Titles
Ballotpedia provides original descriptive titles for ballot measure articles. Ballotpedia does not use the official descriptive title provided by measure proponents or state officials. This is to avoid redundancy and bias. Click here for a full description of our policy on ballot measure article titles.
Short summaries of the effects of "yes" and "no" votes
Ballotpedia's summaries of the effects of a "yes" or "no" vote, "approve" or "repeal" vote, "in favor" or "against" vote, etc. are featured at the top of each ballot measure article, in Ballotpedia's sample ballot tool, and distributed to data clients.
The summary is designed to balance accuracy with accessibility, providing a basic summary designed to be helpful to voters trying to make a quick decision about a ballot measure. The summaries are generally restricted to one or two sentences for each voting option. For that reason, the component does not provide a full understanding of the details of a measure. For that, a review of the rest of a Ballotpedia article or the text of the measure itself is necessary.
The summaries, like all of Ballotpedia's ballot measure summaries, are based on the full legal text of the measure, with guidance from secondary sources.
Short summaries for charts and hub pages
Ballotpedia provides short sentence-long summaries of the main provision of each ballot measure which are featured in hub and overview pages and provided to data clients. These summaries are not designed to give a full explanation of the measure. Rather, they are designed to tell the reader roughly what policy area the measure is about and what direction the measure moves that policy area. They are designed to give our readers enough information to gauge their interest and decide whether to read more or not.
Overview summary
In Ballotpedia's Overview of each ballot measure, a summary of generally between one and three paragraphs is provided. This summary is designed to provide the average reader with an accurate understanding of the most important provisions of a measure. In some cases, depending on the complexity of a ballot measure, the summary in the overview is sufficient to fully understand the details of a measure. In other cases, when a measure's legal text is extremely long and complicated, it serves to highlight the most important provisions, but further reading within the section dedicated to measure design or a review of the full legal text itself is required for a full understanding of all the details of a measure.
In-depth measure design summary
When the overview summary is not sufficient to fully explain the details of each provision of the measure, then an entire section in the ballot measure article is dedicated to fully explaining the provisions found in the full legal text of the measure.
See also
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