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VigilData — One-page concept note

Mission

VigilData lowers the technical barrier to government accountability by turning fragmented public records into accessible tools for journalists, researchers, educators, community organizations, and citizens — especially those without expensive data subscriptions or institutional research teams.

Problem

Campaign-finance records, congressional activity, judicial disclosures, federal spending, and AI-driven discourse signals are produced in increasing volume but remain fragmented across agencies, expensive to license, and difficult for under-resourced newsrooms and community organizations to combine. Public-interest AI raises both the cost of verification and the urgency of source-traceable research infrastructure.

Solution

VigilData is a nonpartisan, open civic-data platform unifying federal accountability data with an AI-assisted research aid (AI Watchdog) that links every signal back to a primary record. Core datasets and tools are free at the point of use.

Current status

• 20+ public accountability modules (Congress, executive, judicial, antitrust, federal debt, AI watchdog, more).
• 547 members of Congress and 9 Supreme Court justices tracked.
• Public methodology, corrections, editorial-independence, governance, and financial-transparency pages.
• Currently a single-founder LLC preparing a nonprofit conversion path; no 501(c)(3) recognition is claimed.

Beneficiaries

• Local and investigative journalists without enterprise data subscriptions.
• Academic researchers and policy analysts.
• Civic educators and instructors.
• Community organizations tracking public officials.
• Citizens auditing their own representatives.

Funder alignment

Aligns with public-interest democracy portfolios: nonpartisan civic engagement, free and fair election administration, campaign-finance transparency, tracking and disclosing dark money, public-interest AI for democracy and rights, and equitable governance. This is an alignment brief, not a claim of endorsement.

12-month plan

• Months 1–3: stabilize ingestion pipelines, complete nonprofit conversion path, publish methodology/corrections logs.
• Months 4–6: ship flagship campaign-finance research brief, expand AI Watchdog safeguards, formalize advisory inputs.
• Months 7–9: launch one-state accountability pilot, publish two explainers and a watchlist, onboard partners.
• Months 10–12: publish annual transparency report, expand state coverage, evaluate Form 1023 filing window with counsel.

Budget request options

• $50,000 — Stabilize federal accountability data infrastructure and publish first research brief.
• $100,000 — Expand AI Watchdog safeguards, source-verification tooling, and editorial review capacity.
• $200,000 — Launch state-level accountability pilot with public dashboards and partner newsrooms.

VigilData's policy is to not rely on any single funder for more than one-third of operating budget where feasible.

Governance & legal status

VigilData currently operates as VigilData LLC and is preparing a nonprofit conversion path. We do not yet claim recognized 501(c)(3) status. Donations are not represented as tax-deductible unless made through a qualified fiscal sponsor. Board formation is in progress. See /governance and /financial-transparency for current status and policies.

Contact

Grants: grants@vigildata.org · Research: research@vigildata.org · Support: support@vigildata.org · Site: vigildata.org / /for-funders.