At the Democratic Audit blog, Katherine Knobloch posted a short essay, “Improving access to information and restoring the public’s faith in democracy through deliberative institutions.” Here’s a quick excerpt: Using a two-wave panel survey of registered Oregon voters, we asked participants whether they thought the government was responsive to the public and if they had faith in their own ability to make good governing...

The Oregon CIR will continue to operate without state funding following the failure to pass Senate Bill 755. For those not in the know, Oregon established the CIR through legislation first in 2009 as a pilot, then in 2011 to set up a Citizens’ Initiative Review Commission that made the CIR a regular part of statewide elections. At the time, Oregon was in a fiscal crisis, so the CIR came without funding. The bill to establish such funding...