The cycling heart of the Democratic Party’s digital future is right here in Massachusetts. As part of BMG’s continuing effort to profile local heroes, behold the Voter Activation Network (VAN), of Cambridge.
The voter file, a computerized database of potential voters, is the electronic heart of a modern campaign. VAN, an outfit with 19 busy employees — they say they are looking for tech-savvy recruits — recently scored an enormous coup by being selected as the lead vendor to the Democratic Party for national voter file services.
As The Hill reported this week:
In what is billed as the next stage of the Democratic National Committee?s (DNC) 50 State Strategy, national and state Democratic staffers are convening in Cleveland this week to train on the party’s new multimillion-dollar nationwide voter file. …
The DNC announced in February that it had signed on with the Voter Activation Network (VAN) to build a nationwide interface for the new voter file, providing greater cohesion from the local level up. The new voter file will be free to all state parties and Democratic candidates.
I spoke recently with Jim St. George of VAN. The company, he said, was started in 2001 by activists frustrated by the lack of electronic infrastructure to support Democratic campaign efforts. “We’ve put every bit of focus into building a stable, reliable, powerful system that would stand up in the intensity of the last 2-3 months before the election. A significant piece of our focus is to make it simple and intuitive for people who are not computer geeks,” he said.
By 2006, the firm had signed up 25 state parties. The DNC signed a nationwide contract in February. Primary candidates all use the same system, but the data they collect is kept separate. After the election, it is pooled and provided to the nominee, St. George added.
Except not in Massachusetts. Interestingly, VAN’s home state is the only one that does not use its system. The local party uses Sage Systems of Boston for its voterfile work. Some of our commenters may have thoughts on this.
The Globe profiled the two companies in 2006, and ran a related article last month: “Candidates spend heavily on voter lists.”
Onward and upward America, on VAN’s digital magic carpet — let’s hope it works as planned in 2008.
You seem to prefer VAN; any particular reason?
it is not the hideous SAGE system that crashes when most needed and is about as intuitive as the flight controls on the NASA space ship? This is a huge mistake to not be part of the national network. VAN is an excllent choice of database software by the DNC and Howard Dean. MA will rue the day this decision was made. This is from a technical consultant who has worked with SAGE and didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at it’s inadequacies. What exactly was the reason for not adopting VAN? Calling John Walsh?
I only discovered the existence of VAN a few weeks ago when I attended a YearlyKos session on political technology, got curious about what system the DNC uses, did some Googling, and discovered them. I certainly didn’t mean to write a post “reeking of anti-Sage sentiment,” as one commenter wrote downthread. I do think it is striking that Massachusetts should be the only state out of 50 not to use the system — that’s why I italicized the fact — but we no doubt have excellent reasons. In any event, since there appears to be interest, I’ll talk to Sage next and see what they say.
I typically am only a “daily reader” of BMG and rarely speak up unless I have direct experiences with the given daily discussion. Glad to hear you will be talking (and hopefully profiling )Sage.
It is an interesting topic for a discussion over beers but let me tell you what it is not, at least in my opinion:
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I fear this might be a bit of a long post (at least for me) but I have some disclosures, some philosophy and some conclusions for you to chew on.
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DISCLOSURES
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PHILOSOPHY
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THE POINT?
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OK. So what does all this mean for this discussion regarding the degree of Massachusetts? participation with the DNCs sole source contract with VAN? (1) We have and will continue to fully participate in the creation and maintenance of a National Voter File in cooperation with the DNC and the Association of State Democratic Chairs. (2) We have and will continue to provide access to the state voter file to any Democratic candidate for a modest fee that reflects our costs. We will do so without regard to which vendor the candidate chooses to manage the data or if they choose to do so without the assistance of a vendor. Our target for turn around time for providing the data (in any common format) is 24 hours. (3) We are in the very early stages of defining what we as a state party want to do with the data in addition to providing it to candidates. As we launch into that, I promise there will be plenty of opportunity to weigh in with your ideas. (4) Our vendor relationships are always under review and as contracts expire, none will be automatically extended. At this time, I am not convinced that endorsing or mandating a single proprietary vendor in order to gain access to the voter file for Massachusetts Democrats is the right way to go. Could that change? Possibly. But if you want to convince me, you can leave these arguments at the door:
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The Massachusetts Democratic Party has enjoyed considerable success in achieving our primary goal of electing Democrats. The potential for building on that success to broaden participation and build a robust grassroots network of engaged Democrats across the Commonwealth is what drives me. Over on Roland St, we are pursuing important initiatives (keep an eye on RomneyFacts.com , get ready to pull out all the stops for our nominee in the 5th CD and if you liked the grassroots philosophy of the Deval Patrick campaign, you will love the new and improved MassDems.org to be unveiled later this fall). Moving aggressively to support local Democratic committees and activists and accomplishing more in 2008 and beyond keeps me focused on our priorities.
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In my opinion, the decision about which vendor is best for a particular campaign to accomplish their goals is best left to that campaign.
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John E. Walsh
Chair
Massachusetts Democratic Party
For those who are interested, here is the announcement from the DNC about the decision that was made to offer free software and training to all state parties. Note that this choice is now used by almost all 50 states, with the exception of CA (which has a highly customized and usable system from what I have been told), MA and one other that I’m not sure of.
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Here is a hypothetical question:
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If there was a senator in, say, Kansas, who was up for reelection and the state party was supposed to be fully behind this candidate and there was an offer of free software on the table from the national party that would benefit a challenger, what would the choices be? Find a way to opt out of receiving the software that would benefit a challenger or accept the offer of software, make it available and just let fate take it’s own course? What if the challenger was the grassroots candidate who didn’t have millions going in to the race? Wouldn’t it be great to point out that it’s a “free market” and say go buy whatever you want? We’re not obligated to help every Democratic candidate, just the ones we want.
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John, I love ya, but I can’t for the life of me understand how a progressive state could openly reject an offer that has been accepted by 47 other states, costs absolutely nothing, benefits the Democratic effort and connects ALL candidates to the process. The message is loud and clear: It’s bidness a usual. It’s all about money and control. Don’t even consider a primary challenge because we’re in the bidness of maintaining the status quo. We’re not here to offer assistance to all Democratic contenders, even though that might actually be a positive. If you can’t see that this is a problem as perceived by many (even those within the party), I still have no high hopes that change is going to occur through Romney Facts. Please excuse me for responding to rhetoric with reason, questions and pleas for transparency. I’m a Democrat, what can I say. I’d be saying the same thing whether I was helping a candidate or not. This is wrong and it is a flagrant slap in the face to those who believe in the grassroots and the 50 state strategy. It has absolutely nothing to do with software choice.
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I believe my candidate, Ed O’Reilly, supports my values and seeks a way to make politics more open and accessible to all. It’s ironic that he seems to care more about the Democratic party and encouraging participation in the process than you do. And, he’s taught me a lot about how to not have fear.
(a nice post by the way)
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…I’m glad that you fully identified yourself and your credentials–in the last paragraph of your first blockquote. I would have had no idea who “john from abington” was.
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Or, quite frankly who John Walsh was (wasn’t there a John Walsh on Fox TV’s America’s Most Wanted a few years back? I doubt that that was you.)
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Actually, re I describe my technical expertise this way. I don’t know how they put the little people inside my TV, I’d almost be willing to bet that you do.
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A mild comment on your comment on Howard Dean’s 50 state strategy. And, with full disclosure, I am not a Democrat, but I am not a Republican either. I don’t disagree with Dean’s desire to reach out to people in all states, but I would disagree with it if it meant having to kow-tow to the racist, sexist and homophobic sections that seem to be driving politics in some sections of the US. If they were to do that, the national Democrats would be nothing more than “Republican lite,” and why would anyone want to vote for Republican lite when they would be able to vote for–a Republican?
was a little silly and the complaints that many people had with each system often boiled down to bad data. Bad data is bad data and VAN or Sage are just the platforms that manage the data.
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I’ve got no dog in this hunt, but I do think it’s in the interest of the Democratic Party–nationally–to have at least two healthily software vendors competing for business. If you get into bed with one, the other one either goes out of business or can not generate enough revenue to develop new features. Over a moderate period of time–a few years–the innovative technology leader you picked as the sole vendor will lose their edge and gets to comfortable. There is no incentive to push the envelop, because they are the only viable game in town.
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The Dem establishment (DNC and State Parties) should develop a long list of feature criteria that ALL software vendors must meet. Assuming more than one vendor meets these standards, each vendor is “certified” as a Democratic campaign software vendor and any state party or campaign can confidently license the software knowing it meets current standards. After each election cycle, new innovations are considered and the standards are improved and all vendors have to meet these standards in order to stay certified. (And among the standards is complete interoperability, so that data can flow between different platforms seamlessly. So if the state party has the data on Vendor A’s platform, a candidate for Gov. can make their own choice about platforms and not worry about data formatting issues.)
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This approach gives us the best of both worlds. The Dem establishment sets a minimum floor on standards and certifies only the vendors that meet these standards. This gives us peace of mind to know our side is using software that is quality. At the same time we maintain a competitive situation with at least two (and there would be more) vendors either competing on price or adding additional features from which campaigns and state parties can make a decision with.
Just wanted to post a quick follow-up to respond to a couple specific issues.
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1) I don’t think this is the best place to try and address issues some folks may have had with Sage – all I have to say there is that if you have had or currently have an issue with Sage, please take a moment to contact us directly. Support contact information is available everywhere in the application itself. If anyone is ever having problem getting support, then please contact me (Israel Alvarez) directly (at 617-291-8489) and I will make sure you get an immediate response.
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2) Concerning the accuracy of data: like VAN and every other list management tool, we do not generate voter data. Voter data is provided by our clients. It would be impossible for us to correct these inaccuracies.
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3) The Massachussetts state party is in fact participaring in the DNC’s program by using the underlying data being offered. Sage has received these updates from the DNC and we are completing the latest file update now.
is clunky, obnoxious and annoying. Good on the DNC.
I have used SAGE on several campaigns in Boston and Cambridge and have always been impressed by their services and support staff. Actually, in 2004 I was a volunteer for the MDP doing data entry into SAGE. I think it’s safe to say, the MDP was successful in electing Democrats in both ’04 and ’06. I find it odd that BMG appears to be denouncing its own “continuing effort to profile local heroes” with this post reeking of anti-SAGE sentiment!
You are now a true warrior. Helluva job treid.
As someone who used Sage over the past two years as a canvasser for MassEquality, I think it is very user friendly and a great system.
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Sage helped save time, man hours, and most importantly it helped us win.
I, too, worked as a canvasser at MassEquality, where we used sage, as well as for MassVictory06, and for Deval Patrick’s primary and general election campaigns, which used it as well.
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Sage constanty showed people registered to vote from addresses that didn’t exsist, or more commonly, from businesses, pubic offices or schools. I’d estimate that, depending on the day, between a quarter and a third of sage’s information was wrong.
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When you are canvassing every day, that amount of time adds up. I have no idea if VAN’s system is any better, but I will say that any system that is able to cut down on wasted canvass time would make the campaign useing it that much more effective.
but that sounds like a GIGO situation…no system is any better than the data fed into it. Of course if SAGE was supposed to be maintaining the databases, that’s a legitimate quality issue, but one separate from the system itself.
I have worked on campaigns in Florida and I think SAGE is a clearly superior system. I have seen the VAN, NGP, leverage, and several other systems so I think I have a good basis for comparison. SAGE is about more than simply managing a list. It?s about a set of well INTEGRATED tools that help you run a campaign effectively. It?s about tech support, and campaign support, when you need it.
You are now a true warrior. Helluva job redviking.
As one of the engineers working on Sage every day, and someone who has worked on quite a few different web applications, I’d like to share a few thoughts.
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First, I’d like to extend my congratulations to VAN: they’re a great company with a good product, and we welcome the competition. Van does certain things Sage does not, and Sage does certain things VAN does not. As with any market space, there is room in the market for multiple solutions, and there are clear differences between the two products, resulting in choice for potential clients.
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Second, we’d like to thank BMG for highlighting our market space. I personally think it’s an interesting area, and have found the blending of technology and politics a fascinating one.
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Third, the are clear differences between the Sage and VAN products. Some of the overarching differences are Sage based on open source tools and open standards, while VAN is based on a proprietary platform. This stems, I believe, from a difference in approach and is ultimately expressed in differences in the interface. For some, the VAN approach is the natural one, while for others, the Sage approach is more intuitive. In my experience, end users tend to be most vocal when they have a bad experience, and there is no way that any single product can be universally loved. Van has focused on a one thing and doing it well, while we have focused on a broader set of tools. And there is little in the way of direct comparison, as the Van is not used here in Mass. Ultimately, direct customer feedback is what is most important, and I can tell you that ours is overwhelmingly positive. We are proud of our product, and we are proud to provide an excellent product to our many clients. Both products have their advocates and detractors.
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I’ll be interested in reading some of the other responses in this thread.
right? Are you in any way technical, because I’ve witnessed meetings about trying to discover the “open source” and possibilities for customization of SAGE, and I’ve got to tell you, I ain’t never in my life seen anything so closed that is supposed to be open. Since there are a whole bunch of posters here who have signed on as of 8/16/07, I guess some nerve was touched. I’d just like to know why the state of MA is going to go it’s separate way when there is the offer of free, accessible, accurate and easy to use software on the table for the asking. And, I wonder where John Walsh is in this discussion because I would guess, after all his experiences with complaints about the SAGE system, he must have a REALLY good reason for not adopting the DNC recommended system that would allow cross training and cohesiveness within the national and state democractic parties. Doesn’t MA lose out in this whole deal? Answer?
Wasn’t Deval for supporting local technology? Wasn’t the message “Together We Can”? Where does that leave MA if there’s no “Together” with the national party? Why would a decision be made to not accept “free” DNC software that could be used by all statewide candidates in this particular year?
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As an FYI — there is a portion of VAN that basically replicates (with added functionality) the whole Deval Patrick community tool. Why would that not be a good thing for MA and all of it’s Democratic candidates?
You are now a true warrior. Helluva job Israel.
Bob, you hit s nerve somewhere…
I think VAN and Sage are of similar quality on the basic field applications like phone-banks and canvasssing. Although the Sage system for cutting canvassing turf in use during the 2006 cycle was terrible. Particularly in the small and confusing streetscape of the Greater Boston Area. I understand VAN now allows you to trace out a canvassing route yourself on a map and it puts together the lists for the user. I think this is a huge plus particularly in urban locales.
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However, the larger issue is data integration. Mass. has a huge turnover in population particularly among young people. Think of the 40,000+ college students in Boston every year. If information about their voting habitats was connected within a larger national network that would help both local efforts and in the swing states. Wouldn’t it be nice to know if some kid volunteered for Deval Patrick last year, graduated, and has now moved back to Ohio after graduation? Or, conversly that someone from New Mexico was a Kerry volunteer in 2004 and has now moved to Boston for work?
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I can’t think of any reason not to be part of the national network, particularly since the data and training is provided free by the DNC. I’ve raised this issue a couple times with various State Committee members but they always shrug their shoulders as if its out of their hands. I’ve heard a rumour that the reason the Mass Dems go with Sage is because of personal connections but at some point the manifest value to going with the DNC system has to outway personal relationships. I mean, how much does the MDP pay each year for a system they could be getting for free?
Let me add my perspective, as a rural-area user of SAGE during a recent gubernatorial campaign.
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SAGE was HORRENDOUS to use, to the point of almost being useless for many functions. Because of a basic design flaw in the canvass kit function, for example, voters were arranged by where they got their mail. Don’t ask me why anyone thought that made sense, but most likely no one thought about it, period. A town is a town is a town, right? WRONG!
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Around here (the Berkshires — yes, we’re part of Massachusetts, not Vermont!), many people do not get their mail in the town where they live. Reasons vary — for convenience, some prefer to pick up their mail at a Post Office near where they work, which may be in a different town. In many cases, people live in a town where there is no Post Office. Try creating a canvass list in a town with an empty population!
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In my town (Alford), the northern half of the town is served by the West Stockbridge Post Office. My ZIP code is 01266, same as for West Stockbridge. They also deliver mail to Interlaken (which is part of Stockbridge). But Stockbridge also has two Post Offices, with their own ZIP codes, so Stockbridge has 3 different ZIP codes, served by 3 different Post Offices, and this in a town with a population of 2,000.
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In the southern part of Alford, the ZIP code is 01230, since mail is delivered by the Great Barrington Post Office, and that is their ZIP code. Problem is, they also deliver mail to several other towns and villages, such as New Marlborough.
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You get the point. Since SAGE thinks all these people live (and vote) where they get their mail, imagine the mess created when a voter list or canvass list is run off. I’ve only scratched the surface here.
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In frustration, I tried to deal with the support people at SAGE, who were of various levels of knowledge, ability, and willingness to help. I spent hours and hours doing trial-and-error reporting to see if I could get kits that would function with minimal hand-editing. It was tough.
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As a person who is pretty facile with computers, I suspect I was able to do a lot of things that the average campaign worker would not have been able to figure out. A friend of mine, who is a relational-database expert, tried to get SAGE to give him an explanation of the structure of the database, and was told he would have to come into the office for a multi-hour presentation on a whiteboard. I had tried to obtain a simple list of the fields that were available and their definitions and was thwarted in that request.
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If this is the best that Massachusetts can do, we’re in deep doodoo, imho. I don’t have an axe to grind for or against any system, but based on my experience, SOMETHING ELSE would be better than SAGE, especially if it’s free, ties in with a national system, and makes sense to the user. Sounds to me like this has not been thought out properly, based on what (admittedly partial) knowledge I have.
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How about a panel of experts to look into it and issue a public report? Or is that too much transparency? Doesn’t sound to me like it would be a real complicated process.
As someone who has worked in 8 states on electoral campaigns of all sizes, using every voter file system out there, it is unbelievable that the MA state party chooses to stay with SAGE rather than switch to the VAN.
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First of all, the VAN is FREE. No cost to the state party, rather than the outrageous fee SAGE charges for a second rate product. Second, technologically, VAN is far superior. Virtual phone banking, mapping, microtargeting, consumer and census data, and managing a field campaign are all superior within the VAN system.
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The GOP has used a national voter file system for over a decade, because it allows them to track voter performance, indepedent voter opinions, consumer data, religious and donor data, etc, which makes campaigns run far more smoothly. Every two years, our field campaigns have to reinvent the wheel. The VAN is a national system, which allows us to compete on a traditional liberal strength: field campaigns and grassroots organizing.
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Data is key to every field campaign, every organization in general.
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Finally, keeping SAGE in the state protects old-school yellow dog incumbents. If John Bonafaz didnt have to build his own voter file (thank you very much SAGE and the MDP), he could have beat SOS Galvan. Instead, we have an SOS that doesnt want Asian people to vote because they are too stupid. The cradle of democracy indeed.
But I have to say, your statement that John Bonifaz could have beat Galvin with better lists is a real stretch. Nothing against John, I like John — but that throws your otherwise informative answer into doubt. Galvin has run statewide three or four times, and John never effectively made the case for tossing him out of office.
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If SAGE protects “yellow dog incumbents”???!!!! Deval is the King of the MA Progressive Movement!!
Thanks to Israel for responding and giving us the phone number. I was going to contact him directly by e-mail but he didn’t include one. So I went to Sage’s home page and clicked on CONTACT. I got the following message:
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Warning: pg_connect() [function.pg-connect]: Unable to connect to PostgreSQL server: FATAL: password authentication failed for user “webuser” in /usr/local/apache2/sage_includes/db.php on line 37
no db connection
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So I’m posting here.
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I’ve used Sage some and while I would have to say that it is certainly non-intuitive.
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The way it creates canvass kits is next to useless. It appears to create the lists based on physical distance not waliking/driving distance, creating bizarre results that waste a lot of time.
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A colleague of mine wasted critical hours on a campaign trying to get a list for a particular precinct. For arbitrary and unclear reasons the precinct in this community needed to have a leading zero.
Although I guess the “open source” thing may be key–it sounds like somebody with pull in the state party decided to take a stand favoring open-source software vs. a proprietary system that everyone else in the country uses…and while I understand the appeal of “open source” for the technophiles, that isn’t how political decisions should be made.
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I’d also like to say how great VAN has been for Florida. When I first heard about it at a meeting of our local DEC, the person describing it mentioned that it was developed by a company in Massachusetts, unlike another system the state party had tried a few years earlier that was developed in-state. I said I was extremely relieved to know that they were buying their technology from Massachusetts instead of Florida…
I’ve used Sage. It’s… ok. Awful for anything other than centralized data use. You can’t have people out in the field doing work in it, other than a few real database experts. It can’t be that hard to create a simplified platform that could be used out in the field on a limited basis. Frankly, having used the Bob Leleivre system ( voter data file creator in Boston designed for progressive candidates), it completely kicks Sage’s ass. If they want to learn what a database should do, they should go to Bob.
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I’ve never used VAN. Maybe it’s good. But the Democratic party has a long long history with Sage, and the new leadership there now have a history with Sage as well. It’s very unlikely that’s going to change anytime soon.
. . . getting ready to head to Shirley for the the big event at the Bull Run Restaurant tonight.
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John Walsh
Chair
Massachusetts Democratic Party
I look forward to your answer. In the meantime, here are some additional questions for you:
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thats a lot of questions/
the result is a lot of answers. 😉
Lori ?
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It is unfortunate that a discussion about vendors can become so charged. I?d written about my perspective on this before reading your latest and I?ll post it separately. I hope folks will take a look at it but I couldn?t let this go unanswered.
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While I appreciate your passion, I have no intention of engaging in a point-by-point back and forth. You?ve developed an opinion that Sage sucks and Van is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Good for you ? it?s a free country. If it?s not clear from other posters here, let me state clearly that your opinion(s) on this matter are not universally held. Of course, the truth about each vendor is probably somewhere in between or as others have suggested here, it probably depends on individual goals and preferences. The good thing about a free market is if you ? or a candidate or cause you support ? prefers a particular vendor, you are free to choose them. One-size-fits-all seldom works in my experience and the ?perfect? vendor is in the eye of the beholder. In the end, I don?t think there is such a thing – and further I think the choice of vendor is way down the list of factors that predict the success of a campaign. The reasons I believe this and therefore why I am focused on other priorities are developed in that separate post.
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I also don?t want to let stand the suggestion that somehow Sage was inadequate for the Deval Patrick campaign. To start, we used this vendor from day one to Election Day ? and we won. Does that mean it was perfect? I?ve already suggested such a thing does not exist. Did we develop outside tools because Sage couldn?t do what we wanted? No ? we developed tools outside of Sage because NO VENDOR was a perfect match for all of our needs. In fact, we were pushing the envelope in ways that no campaign had in the past. One advantage we found with Sage was their willingness to be interoperable as a vendor (a term I learned from our tech guys) and to work within our framework, ideas and other software solutions. Does that mean it?s the correct system for everyone? Not at all. But they were the only shop willing to do so for a little-known, long shot candidate.
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Finally, I guess I won?t hold my breath waiting for you to believe that I will be an agent for change in politics. I?ll have to content myself with knowing that I have always worked very hard to do just that and hope others will look at my history and reputation and at least take a deep breath and judge going forward based on actions and accomplishments. I guess time will tell, but I can categorically say that I?d NEVER do anything that would be a ?slap in the face? to principles Governor Patrick enunciated (and that I spent two years of my life promoting). You may choose to believe that or not. In the interim, I think you would be wise to turn down the rhetoric just a bit. In my experience with him, it doesn?t at all reflect the style of Ed O?Reilly whose cause you purport to advance.
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John Walsh
Chair
Massachusetts Democratic Party
for clarifying. So it’s bidness as usual. Got ya. That’s all you needed to say. I’m quite sure my candidate and potential other candidates in the future will come to appreciate my rhetoric as being mild in asking about something so important to the Democratic cause. Call me crazy.
For the party to win nationally, MA needs to adopt the VAN. More than any other state, MA exports operatives to work on federal, national, and statewide campaigns. It is important that MA adopt the system so that those training on the system a familiar with the system being used by most campaigns.
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Competition is great and this is not a post against Sage. We need to think about what benefits the movement and Democratic candidates across the nation considering our role in creating talent and the next generation of political operatives.