Montana political candidate filing now on-line
Government Office
For more information:
Dennis Unsworth or Mary Baker - (406) 444-2942
Candidates for local, district and statewide political office can now register their campaigns online. The new service is the first of several services intended to modernize campaign filing and financial reporting required by state political disclosure laws. The intent is to simplify the process and provide the public with easier and more direct access to campaign information.
Candidates must register their campaign within five days of either announcing their intention to run for office or beginning to raise or spend money. A flood of registrations is expected in late January.
Candidates for municipal, county, district and statewide offices as well as school trustee candidates in counties with populations of 15,000 or more, or high school districts with student enrollments of 2,000 or more must file the necessary forms with the Commissioner of Political Practices.
Candidates who intend to run in the primary election must also file with the Secretary of Stateís office between January 22 and March 20, and pay a fee.
Additional online services including candidate financial reporting as well as registration and reporting for political action committees (PACs) and similar groups are expected to be available by spring. In addition, a pubic service to view contributor information is expected later in 2008.
The candidate filing service can be found at http://www.campaigntrack.mt.gov/
More information about the office of the Commissioner of Political Practices is available at http://politicalpractices.mt.gov
These services are being cooperatively developed and are supported by the Commissioner of Political Practices, the Department of Administration's Information Technology Services Division, Fiserv Inc. (Nasdaq: FISV), Montana Interactive LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of eGovernment provider NIC (Nasdaq: EGOV), and AssureIT LLP, of Clancy Montana. Startup funding was provided by the Montana Secretary of State from candidate filing fees.
