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Despite Standouts, New CMF Study Reveals Growing Digital Divide in Congress

The Congressional Management Foundation (CMF) bestowed four Congressional member offices with Platinum Awards—the highest honor for its annual Gold Mouse Awards, which recognizes the best Web sites on Capitol Hill. The awards were released as part of CMF’s “Partnership for a More Perfect Union,” a report that found an increasing “digital divide” in the quality of Web sites on Capitol Hill with an almost equal number of sites scoring either an “A” or an “F.”

How is the Partnership funded?

The Partnership For A More Perfect Union is a research center at the Congressional Management Foundation and is funded through foundation grants, fee-for-service programs, and membership of its Partner community.

For town hall meetings to be effective and deliberative - defined as the discussion and consideration of all sides of an issue - citizens need to be able to hear each other and the Member. Likewise, Members of Congress need the opportunity to explain their own policy positions in a face-to-face venue and to hear feedback from as broad and representative a group of their constituents as possible.

Every time we release the results of our Web site evaluations, the first thing most people ask is: 'Who had the worst sites?'

In the first installment of "Inside the Hill", Members of Congress and staff discuss how social media is changing the way Members can communicate with their constituents.

The cornerstone of our democracy is a Congress elected by and accountable to the people. Improving and enriching the relationship between them is essential to forming a more perfect union. And as any relationship expert will tell you, communication is key.

I often get asked by grassroots practitioners just how valuable it is for constituents to add in personal stories, or tailor the suggested text in a grassroots campaign to their Member of Congress.