Better legislative information

While I very much appreciate the recent upgrades to the Tennessee legislature's bills filed section I certainly hope that we can make even more progress. I visit the legislative pages of various states in our nation and it's obvious that Tennessee can do better.

Today I had to visit North Dakota.

Here's their education legislation overview page. Here's Tennessee's. I do like the format of ours better (if we could just put the companion bills together). It's easier to read with the columns and shading (good job guys).

Two things North Dakota does much better is they, like many other states, clearly show you what is being removed and added from legislation by the use of strike throughs and underlines.









Here's their legislative drafting manual.

They also provide:

E-mail Notification of Notices, Minutes, and Calendar provides the form for requesting e-mail notification of Legislative Council committee meeting notices and minutes and of the Legislative Calendar and Update.

Minutes! You can, and I did, subscribe to the minutes of their Education Committee. I can't even find the minutes of the Tennessee Education Committee online.

UPDATE: ditto Nebraska:





And they have a "Hello, I'm new here" link that helps folks new to the process. Great idea.

Here's Georgia's tracking system.

And Washington State's.