Help Center
Find answers and learn how to make the most of The Ballot Book
Overview
Welcome to our documentation! Here, you’ll find details about how we gather and present California’s socioeconomic data, election results, voter registration patterns, and more. We bring together disparate sources—like the U.S. Census, the Secretary of State, and local county offices—into one place to make exploring communities and districts simpler.
What You’ll Find
- Geography: Learn how district maps and shapefiles are obtained, and why some boundaries may appear different.
- Census Data: Discover the 2020 block-level population figures and the 2019–2023 ACS estimates we use to measure demographics, housing, and more.
- Voter Registration: Understand how counties track voters by party, ethnicity, and gender—and why those numbers might be partially suppressed or approximate.
- Election Results: See how statewide races (like Governor or propositions) are broken down to individual cities or districts.
- Local Elections: Dive into city council, county supervisor, and school board results aggregated from sources like the California Elections Data Archive (CEDA).
- District Overlaps: Explore how jurisdictions overlap population-wise, showing what percentage of one district’s residents also belong to another.
How to Use These Pages
Each help topic—like Census Data or Local Elections—has its own page describing the data sources, methodology, and any quirks to watch out for. Feel free to browse them in any order via the sidebar. If you have questions or spot something that looks off, these sections should explain why it might happen and where to look next.