Postmedia’s ‘Follow the Money’ shortlisted

A first-of-its-kind data journalism project by Postmedia News has been nominated for two prestigious 2018 Data Journalism awards.

The ambitious project — Follow the Money — was conceived by reporter Zane Schwartz as part of the yearlong Michelle Lang Postmedia fellowship.

The Data Journalism Awards received 630 entries from 58 countries. The winners will be announced at a gala dinner on May 31.

Records of political donations are on the public record. But they’re hardly transparent or accessible. To find out how much one donor has given to a candidate over a number of years, for instance, or how much one industry has contributed to a party, requires a level of detective work out of reach for most watchdogs and researchers, let alone the average voter.

Schwartz worked with a team of journalists at Postmedia and developers at Qlik to create an accessible search tool for contributions at both the federal level and in every province and territory.

Compiled from more than six million records that add up to more than $2 billion, it is Canada’s first centralized, searchable database of donations. Follow the Money was nominated in the open data and public choice categories.

The Globe and Mail is the only other Canadian outlet nominated, in the investigation of the year category.

The data journalism competition — the first international awards recognizing outstanding work in the field of data journalism worldwide — is supported by Google News Initiative, Knight Foundation and Microsoft, in partnership with Chartbeat.

Schwartz’s fellowship honours award-winning Calgary Herald journalist Michelle Lang, who was killed in 2009 while reporting from Afghanistan.