Left In Lowell

Class, school is now in session. Please stop throwing spitballs and pay attention…yes, Timmy, you can go to the bathroom if you hurry up. It’s almost time to hand out the latest grades for web presences of candidates in the special election for the 5th Congressional district! There’ve been some remarkable improvements from the previous grade over the semester for most of the class. However, the tests are also a little bit tougher now!

Eileen Donoghue: Councilor Donoghue has gone from a virtual bookmarker page to an actual website since the last grade was issued. It boasts several sections, including the beginnings of a set of issues pages. Navigating the secondary pages is a little counter-intuitive, as the submenu is located on each page on the right. Drop-downs from the main menu probably would have been a better bet, or else lefthand or horizontal submenus for each page, but that’s getting a little nitpicky. It validates to its HTML standard (XHTML 1.0 Transitional, which is about two steps back from the standard I like to use these days, but the code used on this website conforms to the standard used). It also uses passes CSS validity, as well as basic web accessibility standards. Other features still include an ActBlue box for donations (I like ActBlue), a simple email updates form (as well as more lengthy one for potential volunteers), and an RSS feed for the news page, all good. In the News section, she links to her Flickr page, a bit of new media savvy which is interesting. Information on the site is well-categorized and fairly easy to find with the above menu caveats.

The design is clean, though rather boring, and not very graphical once you leave the front page which has a large photo of Donoghue. This could be a good or bad thing depending on how you like your sites. However, the thing I am more concerned with is the content. While the Issues pages have some details and specifics, they each only give you about 2-4 paragraphs of information on the four positions posted (all narrative). Although the rule of thumb for most types of sites is to keep it short (web attention spans are notoriously fickle), for a candidate site, I want a lot more. And organizing details about positions and proposals should make full use of bullet points, sub headers, page dividers, and the summary-then-details format of most white papers. This is a good start, but it by no means gives me a complete picture of Donoghue’s intentions once she gets to Congress. Though some say a freshman Rep doesn’t get much floor time in their first few years, it doesn’t mean I don’t want my elected official to have firm goals. An eagerness to take on active advocacy on some of the big issues (obviously one Rep can’t do everything) shows the tenacity which will be necessary to get our district back to its seniority status in principle, even if not in years, with the loss of Rep. Meehan. B, primarily for the content issue.

Jamie Eldridge: Having gotten the highest mark in my first post, Rep. Eldridge’s website had the least distance to go. It still has all of the elements that earned him an A- previously, including a new detailed policy page on health care, with which he launched his campaign (officially) last Thursday. He still has the best issues pages layout, with a problems/solutions format. He lists specific existing proposed legislation he would sign on to cosponsor, showing a depth of knowledge of where Congress is at this time on the issues. He takes chances on telling you what other proposals he would support or create. In effect, he shows us a level of policy wonkery I don’t think any other candidate shares.

If I have any complaints, it’s that the new media sections (JamieRadio and JamieTV) are still a little clunky, and only have one or two items in each. Heck, the campaign should create its own new media content for those sections and play it up (as the Patrick campaign did).

The navigation is getting a little trickier as the campaign adds content - in the issues section, the long links have some weird spacing and it’s hard to visually differentiate where one link ends and the next one begins due to margin issues and lack of demarcation. This works fine when menu links are all short one-liners, but not so much for the longer stuff, which is also taking up a lot of space on the sidebar (it could be fine, but it pushes the other links way down the page). Might be time to reevaluate the menu system a little bit. If I might be so bold to suggest, push down the content box a little and put in a vertical menu with drop-downs styled entirely with CSS (using nested unordered lists for logical web accessibility). Sorry, geeked out there for a second.

Also, it might be nice to get fair warning that the “Detailed Campaign Flyer” link at the top of the Where Jamie Stands box is actually a large PDF that will take some time to download (I usually add “PDF” and the file size in parenthesis after a link to a PDF).

Eldridges’ site does not validate for XHTML 1.0 Transitional (the standard the site uses) or totally proper CSS, but more importantly, it doesn’t pass the accessibility testing (primarily for failure to use alt tags with images). This definitely should be rectified as soon as humanly possible. That’s why I’m going with a B+ for his grade, a step down, which could be lower (due to accessibility problems) except for the profuse detail in his content.

Barry Finegold: Rep. Finegold’s website has not changed at all, that I can tell, since his last grade, not even to add any more content. So, all of the pluses and minuses I wrote about before apply, except that by standing still, he loses some web momentum. I can’t validate his HTML or CSS because of a missing string which is supposed to denote character encoding, though it does adhere to basic accessibility standards. C-.

Jim Miceli: Rep. Miceli finally has something up, which I found by Googling. It’s really a pretty ugly bookmarker site, with super-basic links to donate (with an ActBlue link, not an embedded form), and an In the News section linking to one article. It’s an improvement over nothing, and I’ll be generous and give him a D, but Miceli needs to take his web presence more seriously, and quick.

Niki Tsongas: Tsongas’ new website is certainly a far cry from the small-though-intriguing one pager which she launched with earliest, a testament to her web crew. The design is aesthetically pleasing, graphically interesting, and very easy to navigate with drop down menus. I think design-wise things could tighten up vertically by allowing less space in the banner section, but only because “tall” websites drive me mad (it pushes the important stuff, the content, down too far). This site isn’t a huge violator of that rule, however.

The content is much more detailed than it was as well, with a long bio, and a letter from Tsongas about why she’s running. Tsongas has also implemented the Community Tool, a web-based volunteer system made famous by the Patrick campaign (and no wonder, as Tsongas hired Patrick’s former web guru).

The site does not completely validate for accessibility (mostly alt tags for images), nor is it 100% compliant with the XHTML Transitional code standards. Again, the former is really the issue (lack of HTML validation doesn’t necessarily mean the site will break or be unreadable).

As to content, on one hand, there’s a lot more meat than we had before and that’s great. On the other hand, not near enough for a satisfying meal. Take this paragraph for instance:

Veteran’s Care—Honoring Their Commitment: We must care for our troops once they return to the United States. As the daughter of an Air Force colonel whose childhood and teenage years were spent moving from one military base to another, I know how important it is to treat our men and women in uniform with respect and care. There is no excuse for the condition of our veterans’ facilities. It is not just the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, which has received so much attention for the poor quality of its ambulatory care facility. The Boston Globe recently reported on the deplorable conditions of some New England veterans’ hospitals and clinics. Meanwhile, according to the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans, veterans of previous wars account for 23% of all homeless people in America. It is unconscionable that we show such neglect. We must make an immediate commitment to repay their sacrifice. We now have a new generation of combat veterans who need us to fight for them, as they have fought for us. We cannot afford to fail them.

All right, great. We can all agree on this, no controversy there. Donoghue, on the other hand, has a slightly more concrete thought on the matter: “The first piece of legislation Eileen would file if elected will be an updated G.I. Bill of Rights, to extend the promise and opportunities her father’s generation enjoyed to today’s veterans. The bill would guarantee today’s veterans access health care equivalent to the excellent care members of Congress and the President receive.” At least there’s mention of a specific piece of legislation here. Tsongas’ page on global warming isn’t any better:

Reduce Greenhouse Gases: Scientists and an increasing numbers of business leaders agree, the best way to slow global warming is to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. I support legislation that would put a cap on total emissions from a wide range of sources including electric power, transportation, industry, and commercial sectors.

Uh…yeah. And? How far should the cap go? Can we at least get a sense of Tsongas’ proposed timeframe? Her language is pretty, and very totally absolutely uncontroversial. I’m for puppies and lollipops too…but, how are we going to get them to the masses? A website is an opportunity to go into details that would bore a TV ad’s audience, and give readers a sense of your grasp of wonkery. Now, this leaves your ideas open for attack, and Tsongas is no stranger to this (ie the health care debate). But it’s the candidate’s job to convince us, and a well-reasoned, detailed position will do that. The race has unofficially been on for a couple months now…time to get seriously wonk. (This applies to all candidates.) I’ll give her a B, but I’m looking for some turnaround on substance pretty soon.