LOD: View Lawmaker’s Stocks, Job

WRAL-TV has created a searchable database of the major stockholdings listed by NC legislators and other state officials on their ethics disclosure forms. For example, eight legislators disclosed owning at least $10,000 worth of stock in Duke Energy or Progress Energy – although the amounts may be much higher, and smaller amounts held by others are not disclosed at all. You can also view property holdings, jobs and other economic data for officials and their households. Mark Binker of WRAL-TV describes the project on a video and in a print story on the station’s website. Thanks for this great work, team WRAL! Posting all these reports in an accessible, searchable format should be something that the Ethics Commission does, but that agency hasn’t devoted its scare resources to the task. And the task is all the harder because many officials file handwritten, difficult-to-read reports. There is no requirement that legislators file their economic interest reports in an electronic format – a shortcoming that also undermines access to campaign finance reports. The General Assembly seems happy to have this part of state government stuck in the 20th century.