Using this site
What the tabs hold, what a timestamp claims and what it does not, how to follow a bill, and how to tell us we are wrong.
Granite Record indexes the public record: what each bill does, who sponsored it, when it was heard, how it was voted on, and where in the recording that happened.
What a bill's page holds
- Summary — the General Court's own analysis, the current status, and a narrative of what has happened, in order, with each action linked to the journal or calendar that recorded it.
- Votes — every recorded roll call, by member. Voice and division votes appear in the narrative but have no member-by-member record to show, because none was made.
- Videos — the hearing and floor recordings, opened at the moment the bill was taken up.
- Reports — what the committee recommended and why, in the committee's own words, and the Governor's message where a bill was vetoed.
- Sponsors, and Documents — the official pages this all comes from.
What a timestamp claims
Not all of them claim the same thing, and the page says which.
- Where the chair can be heard opening an item, the time is that moment.
- Where a roll call has a clock time in the official record, that is used.
- Otherwise the time is estimated from where the bill appears in the recording, and it says approximate. It can be several minutes out.
Captions are never quoted here. Automatic transcription renders "HB 1381" as "HP 1381" often enough that a quotation would be a transcription error wearing the clothes of a citation. The timestamp is the claim; the recording is the evidence.
Reading the shorthand
| OTP | Ought to Pass — a motion to pass the bill |
| OTP/A | Ought to Pass with Amendment |
| ITL | Inexpedient to Legislate — a motion to kill it |
| MA / MF | Motion Adopted / Motion Failed |
| VV | Voice vote — no record of individual votes |
| DV | Division vote — counted, names not recorded |
| RC | Roll call — each member recorded by name |
| CC | Consent Calendar |
| OT3rdg | Ordered to a third reading |
| HJ / SJ | House or Senate Journal, and the page |
| -FN | Carries a fiscal note |
| -A | Contains an appropriation |
| -LOCAL | Has a local fiscal impact, on towns or schools |
Following a bill
Every bill, member and committee has an RSS feed, and there is one for upcoming hearings. No account, no email address, nothing to leak.
Telling us we are wrong
This is assembled by machine from official sources and it will be wrong somewhere. If you find something wrong — particularly on these explanatory pages, where an error is harder to spot than a wrong date — write to [email protected].