TaxLoop creates a closed feedback loop between you and your elected representatives. Each stage builds on the last to ensure your voice is heard and your legislators are held accountable.
Preferences are submitted separately for each government level: Seattle, King County, WA State, and Federal.
The sliders start at the current official allocation — move them to show how you'd change the budget.
Your submission is private; only aggregated, anonymous results are shared with legislators.
Reports include mean, median, and distribution of allocations across all budget categories.
Legislator staff receive the report in a standardized PDF format they can reference during deliberations.
Individual responses are never shared — only neighborhood-level aggregates.
We pull roll-call votes from Congress.gov, LegiScan (state), and council minutes (local).
Each vote is scored as MATCH or DIVERGE based on whether it aligns with the neighborhood's top priorities.
Your per-legislator alignment score is a percentage: how often they voted in line with your preferences.
Category-by-category breakdown showing the difference between community preferences and the enacted budget.
Highlights where your legislator advocated for or against your neighborhood's priorities.
Available as an interactive dashboard and downloadable PDF.
Pulls actual expenditure data from USAspending.gov (federal), state fiscal databases, and local open-data portals.
The 'execution gap' measures the average percentage-point difference between budgeted and actual spending.
Closes the full accountability loop — preferences → votes → budget → spending.
🎚️Stage 1
📨Stage 2
🗳️Stage 3
📊Stage 4
🔍Stage 5
📖Glossary
Alignment Score
A percentage (0–100%) indicating how often a legislator's budget-related votes match your stated preferences. 70%+ is green (strong), 40–69% is orange (moderate), and below 40% is red (weak).
Execution Gap
The average percentage-point difference between the enacted budget and actual government spending. A gap of 0 means the government spent exactly what was budgeted.
Budget Category
Major spending areas like Public Safety, Transportation, Housing & Affordability, Education, etc. Each government level has its own set of categories based on its official budget structure.
Top Priorities
The 3 budget categories you care about most. TaxLoop gives extra weight to these when generating alignment reports and messaging.
Government Level
The layer of government: Seattle (city), King County (county), Washington State (state), or Federal (U.S. Congress). Each has its own budget cycle and set of legislators.
Budget Cycle
The time period a budget covers. Seattle uses annual fiscal years (e.g., FY2027), King County uses biennial cycles (2025–2026), WA State is biennial (2025–2027), and the federal government uses fiscal years (FY2027).
MATCH / DIVERGE
Tags on individual legislator votes. MATCH means the vote aligns with your neighborhood's priorities. DIVERGE means it goes against them.
Allocate Remaining
A tool on the Preferences page that distributes unallocated budget percentage using one of three strategies: Proportional (by baseline %), Priority-weighted (extra to your top 3), or Even split.
🏷️Icon & Symbol Guide
These icons appear throughout TaxLoop. Hover over any icon on other pages to see a tooltip explanation.
🎚️
Budget Slider
Drag left or right to change how much of the budget you want allocated to this category. The marker shows the current official allocation.
📊
Alignment Chart
Bar chart showing how closely a legislator's votes match your preferences. Green = strong alignment, orange = moderate, red = weak.
🗳️
Vote Tracking
Indicates that TaxLoop is monitoring legislative votes. Each vote gets a MATCH or DIVERGE tag based on your neighborhood's priorities.
📨
Report Delivery
Shows that an aggregate report has been or will be delivered to your legislator before budget hearings.
🔍
Execution Audit
Compares the enacted budget to actual spending. The execution gap metric shows how closely the government stuck to the plan.
✉️
Send Message
Opens the messaging tool to send a pre-drafted message to your legislator about your budget priorities.
Color Coding
Strong / Match (70%+)
Moderate (40–69%)
Weak / Diverge (<40%)
City (Seattle)
County (King Co.)
State (WA)
Federal (U.S.)
❓Frequently Asked Questions
Yes. Your individual preferences are never shared with legislators or anyone else. Only aggregated, anonymized neighborhood-level data is included in reports delivered to elected officials.
TaxLoop is currently piloting in the 98108 zip code of Seattle, WA. This covers City Council District 2, King County Council District 2, WA 37th Legislative District, and U.S. Congressional District WA-9.
We identify budget-related votes for each legislator, compare each vote to your neighborhood's aggregate preferences, and calculate the percentage of votes that align. Each vote is weighted equally.
Ideally before your government body's budget deliberation period. TaxLoop will notify you when preference windows open for each government level. You can update your preferences at any time.
Yes. You can resubmit preferences as many times as you like before the aggregation deadline. Your most recent submission is the one included in the aggregate report.
Seattle: city open data portal. King County: county open data portal. WA State: legislative fiscal databases and LegiScan. Federal: Congress.gov for votes, USAspending.gov for execution data.
Some government levels haven't had budget votes yet in the current cycle. 'Pending' means TaxLoop is tracking the legislative session and will generate reports as soon as relevant data becomes available.
Go to the My Legislators page, click any legislator card to expand it, and use the 'Send Message' button. TaxLoop pre-generates a message based on your priorities that you can customize before sending via email or the legislator's official contact form.
🗄️Data Sources
Federal
Congress.gov — roll-call votes, bill text, sponsor/cosponsor data
USAspending.gov — enacted budget and actual expenditure data
ProPublica Congress API — additional legislative metadata
WA State
LegiScan — state bill tracking, vote records, and legislative sessions
WA State Fiscal Information — budget documents and spending reports
WA Legislature website — committee schedules and bill analysis
King County
King County Open Data (Socrata) — budget and expenditure data
King County Council website — agendas, minutes, and vote records
Seattle
Seattle Open Data (Socrata) — city budget and spending data
Seattle City Council — legislation, vote records, and meeting minutes
Seattle Budget Office — adopted budgets and quarterly spending updates
Ready to close the loop?
Submit your budget preferences, track legislator votes, and hold your government accountable.