SourceLine is the Black Civic Data Platform, for every state and the District of Columbia. Type your address or ZIP code and you will see who represents you, from city hall to Congress, how they vote, where the money goes, and how Black residents are doing where you live, by the numbers. Then you can tell us what you want to see happen, and see who has the power to make it happen.
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Why I built SourceLine
For most of my life, the subjects that shaped my understanding were stored in separate places. History was separated from economics. Politics was separated from culture. Education was separated from institution building. A teacher, a book or an experience would open a door, and then I had to assemble the larger picture for myself. I spent years trying to understand how those pieces belonged together.
What I came to believe is that the Black community already has most of what it needs. Knowledge has been earned, relationships have been built, resources have been assembled, and people among us have learned how to move work through systems that are hard to enter. The trouble is that so much of it stays attached to the person who carries it, or reaches us only when a relationship happens to open the right door. We do not need everyone to agree on everything. We need to connect the dots.
I learned that from experience. Years ago Horace Small, who founded and led the Union of Minority Neighborhoods in Boston, began helping me think differently about my work. He introduced me to donors. More importantly, he helped me learn to state my position publicly without surrendering the position itself. Nobody had to give up control of anything. Knowledge built in Boston strengthened work in Metro Atlanta because people decided it should not stop with them. In 2022 I sketched a map that would let a person start with a ZIP code and find the people who make decisions about their life. The idea was my own. In 2023 I pitched it to Horace as something we could build for the organization we were working on together, if we could find the funding, and I pitched it to others after him. In time I found a way to build it myself, and it became SourceLine.
What stands between our votes and what gets done
For years much of my political work was organized around elections. I helped educate voters, worked with candidates and helped people get to the polls. I still believe in that work. Who holds office matters because the authority attached to the office is real. Budgets are approved, land is rezoned, contracts are awarded and schools are funded by the people we elect.
What troubled me was what happened after the election. We could work hard enough to help someone win and still have no agreed plan for what came next. Once the election was over, most of us went back to our regular lives, while the people who understood the machinery of government kept working. So the question changed for me. What connects a community concern to a policy, a policy to a candidate, a candidate to a budget, and a budget to something that actually gets done? And who keeps watching when everyone else has moved on?
A people cannot demand what it cannot see. SourceLine is built to make it visible.
The measure is Black progress
I built SourceLine as a Black man, for the Black community, and I want to be plain about what that means. SourceLine does not belong to a party. A Republican and a Democrat get the same checks from the same public records, and neither one gets a pass because of a label. But I am not neutral about what happens to our communities, and I do not think anyone keeping the record for Black people should pretend to be. So every policy and every official is measured against one question: what does the record show it does for Black progress, or against it?
When a gap between Black residents and everyone else grows, SourceLine says so with the numbers and with the names of the people who decided it. The facts carry the conclusion. We do not claim to know anyone's motives, and when an official gives a reason for a vote, that reason appears beside what critics say. Where something is my own view, you will see it labeled as mine, so you can always tell what the record shows from what I believe.
Every number on SourceLine is shared for the same reason: to build. When we report how many of our children read at grade level, how many of our families rely on SNAP or live in public housing, or how many Black businesses have employees, it is not to look down on anyone. Our community already knows these issues. The numbers show where we stand, so we can decide where we are going, who can help us get there, and how we will know when things are better.
From what you want to what it will take
Every change a community wants has an address. It belongs to a body that can act on it, and that body needs a certain number of votes. A city council may need four. The Georgia House needs 91 of its 180 members. In Congress it takes 218 votes in the House and, for most bills, 60 in the Senate to end debate. Knowing who decides and how many votes it takes changes how you organize.
Too often residents arrive after the decision has already been made. SourceLine is built so your voice can arrive in time.
- Tell us what you want to see. Choose a topic like housing, roads, jobs, schools, safety or health, or write your own. You do not need an account. You can sign your name or stay anonymous; that choice is yours.
- See who stands with you. Right away you see how many others in your district raised the same concern.
- See who decides, and when. Your concern is matched to the body that can act on it, the people in those seats, how they have voted on related items, and what is coming up on their agenda.
- Follow it. Follow emails are coming soon. Until then, the issue page shows the next date and every vote.
- Bring a neighbor. Every person who adds their voice makes the count harder to ignore.
What you will find
Wherever you live in the country, you will find who represents you in Congress and in your state legislature, how they voted, and a snapshot of Black America from the nation down to your state, county, district and city: people and voting power, money, home, food, health, education, business and work, safety and justice, and public money. Where SourceLine covers local government, today in 82 places across California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, Wisconsin and Washington, DC, you will also find your local officials and how to reach them, recent and upcoming decisions linked to the official record, and the federal money that reached your community.
Our stories start with the national record and carry it down to your address, so you can see how it reaches your street and who decides it. On the record places what officials, candidates and the press say beside what the record shows. And any official named on an issue can answer on the record, confirmed through their government email, so their own words sit beside their votes.
SourceLine began in Georgia, including rural counties where this information is hardest to find, and it grows state by state.
How we keep it honest
Anyone who asks for public trust should show their sources, keep reporting separate from opinion, and correct what they get wrong. SourceLine holds itself to that. Every number names its official source and the date we last checked it, with a link to the original.
Every official is shown the same way, whatever their party. Population, voting age citizens, registered voters and people who actually voted are kept as separate numbers, because each one tells a different story. What residents tell us, what officials did, what officials say in response, and any summary written by artificial intelligence are kept apart and clearly labeled. SourceLine never publishes individual voter records, and your name appears beside a concern only if you choose to sign it. Report a correction
Built to last
A generation should not have to begin again because the record was scattered across private files, websites that disappeared and the memory of one person. SourceLine keeps the record in one place, so anyone coming behind us can see what was promised, what was done and what remains unfinished.
SourceLine was founded by Kazemde Ajamu, an author, entrepreneur and community builder in Stonecrest, Georgia. He is the author of Think Black: The Manifesto and Trusting the Eyes Behind You, owner of Akoma Coffee & Books, and Executive Director of Black Dot Cultural Center & Leadership Academy. He also serves as Vice Chairman of the Lithonia Housing Authority. SourceLine reports federal money to every housing authority, including Lithonia's, from the same sources and by the same methods.
Free for residents
Everything a resident needs is free: your officials, their votes, the money, the decisions and the chance to be counted. Organizations, campaigns and researchers who need deeper reports, comparisons across places and downloads can use SourceLine Insights. SourceLine Insights for organizations
Start with your address
I still believe in taking people to the polls. SourceLine does not make voting less important. It gives the vote somewhere to go.