I Blog, You Blog, We All Blog, State Legislatures, March 2005 (Restricted to registered users)

NCSL - State lawmakers are beginning to see the advantages of having a blog to record their views on issues and their experiences at the statehouse.

Making E-Communications Work: Strategies to Manage Web Sites and E-Mail, February 2003
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Provides background information on what citizens expect from legislative Web sites and how they prefer to communicate with their elected officials. Provides practical ideas and strategies for creating and managing legislators' personal Web sites and e-mail.

Resources to assist state legislators in using and managing e-mail.

Resources to assist state legislators in developing personal Web sites.

State Legislators' Perceptions of the Use of E-mail in Constituent Communication, Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Vol 8, issue 4, July 2003

Measures and compares the attitudes and perceptions of state legislators toward e-mail.

Scholarly articles reporting on a survey of state legislators to determine how legislators feel about constituency service and the use of technology, whether they believe email has a positive effect on communication, whom they contact via email and the impact of the Internet on the legislature.

Scholarly article that studies factors contributing to Tennessee legislators’ use of e-mail to communicate with their constituents.

Scholarly article that reviews the literature on the use of information technology in state legislatures and in Congress and uses results from a survey of legislators in California, Georgia, and Iowa to examine how state legislators use e-mail.

NCSL - Links to Web sites of state legislatures.

25 Great Online Ideas Worth Stealing

NCSL State Legislatures article: States are using the Internet in creative, innovative ways from which other states can and should benefit.

NCSL Online Democracy Award

NCSL's Online Democracy Award is given each year to a legislature, legislative chamber or caucus whose website stands out for making democracy user-friendly.

NCSL - Provides links to privacy policies of legislative Web sites.

NCSL - Policies regarding external links from legislators' pages on legislative Web sites.

Center for Digital Government - Survey of state legislatures on how the legislative branch uses technology to manage its own work and to give real-time access to their deliberations to a watching public. In-depth profiles of programs and applications, management style, collaborative efforts and strategic partnerships in five states.

Cyberdemocracy v. Egovernment: The Degree of Interactivity on State Legislative Websites

By Paul Ferber, Franz Hola, Rudy Pugliese, Rochester Institute of Technology. Paper prepared for delivery at the 2004 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Chicago, Il., September 1-5, 2004. Copyright by the American Political Science Association

Center for Digital Government  - Ranks legislatures based on their service offerings to citizens and within the legislature. (Sept. 2002)

By Paul Ferber, Franz Hola, Rudy Pugliese. Legislative Web sites are evaluated on five criteria: Content, Usability, Interactivity, Transparency, and Audience.

NCSL - Provides links to Web sites of legislative information technology offices.

Legislative Webcasts of Floor Proceedings, Committee Hearings, and Archiving of Webcasts

NCSL - Links to states that webcast legislative proceedings, committee hearings and that archive proceedings.

Closed Captioning of Broadcasts

NCSL - States that close caption broadcasts of legislative proceedings.

Primetime Democracy

NCSL - State Legislatures, January 2006 (Registration required). A growing number of public affairs networks demystify democracy.

For the Record: Legislative Internet Broadcasts

NCSL LegisBrief, June/July 2002 (Registration required.) Reviews states that provide video or audio coverage of legislative proceedings over the Internet and discusses the rules on who controls and funds the broadcasts, as well as the rights to use them.

NCSL LegisBrief, Nov./Dec. 2000 (Registration required) States that offer Internet coverage of legislative floor and committee sessions.

NCSL - States that provide legislators with laptops or PCs for use in the chambers.

State Bill Tracking and Update Services

Every state offers free public access to bill status and/or bill text via the Internet.  However, a number of states offer additional bill tracking features on legislative websites. 

Going Paperless

NCSL State Legislatures article: There may never be a completely electronic legislature, but some are getting close.

Digital Preservation Resources

States and state legislatures face critical challenges in preserving digital information and official records.  This site offers links to information to raise awareness and provide tools and resources that will help legislatures with efforts to preserve significant government information.

Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity

Reports and Presentations from the National Association of Legislative Information Technology (NALIT).

Survey of Legislative Information Systems

National Association of Legislative Information Technology (NALIT) and NCSL - 50 state survey of how legislatures use technology. Covers many areas, including applications and software, networking, chamber and voting systems, and Web sites, among others.

Texas Senate Media and NCSL's Legislative Information and Communications Staff Section - The Texas Senate Media department conducted a survey in September 2002 to find out how state legislatures are archiving and using web, video, audio, and photography. 

National Association of Legislative Information Technology

NCSL's association for computer and IT staff in state legislatures.