David Eads is a former news applications developer at ProPublica Illinois, where he combined journalism with software development. Ever since he built the website for his high school newspaper in 1996, Eads knew he wanted to work at the intersection of media and technology. He moved to Chicago for college in 1999, studying physics at North Park University. During school he helped found the Invisible Institute, where he also maintained a blog about Chicago public housing called The View From The Ground. He later helped create FreeGeek Chicago, a community-based computer recycling organization and the Supreme Chi-Town Coding Crew, a weekly workshop to teach data journalism. He’s also worked on visual journalism teams at the Chicago Tribune and, most recently, at NPR Visuals.
David Eads
News Applications Developer
Anatomy of the Gambling Bill
Illinois is going to dramatically expand gambling. Here’s the bill and what it means.
The Ticket Trap: Front to Back
The project gave us an opportunity to try a bunch of technical approaches that could help a small organization like ours develop sustainable news apps.
How to Use the Ticket Trap, Our New Database That Lets You Explore How Chicago Tickets Motorists and Collects Debt
We hope you’ll play around with it and let us know how we can make it better.
The Ticket Trap
We’ve collected data on 54 million tickets issued over the past two decades in the city. Search for your address and compare your ward with others, and see how Chicago’s reliance on ticketing affects motorists across the city.
Explore Racial Disparities in Hundreds of Illinois Schools and Districts
Takeaways from our “Miseducation” app and how you can use it, too.
Miseducation
Is there racial inequality at your school? Look up more than 96,000 individual public and charter schools and 17,000 school districts to see how they compare.
What More Can We Learn From Chicago Ticket Data?
We’ve made the data easy to download, and we invite you to use it as we keep reporting.
When Mapping the Many Disparities in Chicago, It Can Feel Like It’s the Same Story Being Told
But maps can turn personal experiences into powerful evidence.
How ProPublica Illinois Uses GNU Make to Load 1.4GB of Data Every Day
We’ve open-sourced our code for loading Illinois campaign finance data. The process used to take hours. Learn how Make helped cut that down to less than 30 minutes.
When Do Reporters Collaborate, and When Do They Compete?
Increasingly, we work together to produce stronger journalism.
Every Day, a Child is Held Beyond Medical Necessity in Illinois
Hundreds of children and teens in state care are held each year in psychiatric hospitals for weeks or months at a time — even though they have been cleared to leave.
How Journalist Susie Cagle’s Illustrations Help Us “Follow The Money”
The former “words” journalist “bet on pictures.” Now her comics journalism is much in demand.
We’ve Updated Our Campaign Widget to Better Help You Follow the Money
In the pricey Illinois governor’s race, it’s more important than ever.
We’ve Updated ‘The Money Game,’ Our Illinois Governor’s Race Fundraising Widget
We now show candidates’ self-funding and have cards to share on social media.
How We Made Our Illinois Governor’s Campaign Finance Widget
It's the first of many experiments to reach our audience with useful, data-driven visual journalism.
New Widget Helps You Follow the Money in the Illinois Governor’s Race
We’ve created a widget you can use to track fundraising and spending in the Illinois governor’s race, which is on track to break records.
Chicago Police Department Grievances
A Chicago Tribune-ProPublica Illinois investigation tracked more than 300 police disciplinary cases appealed through the department’s labor office. We analyzed changes between original discipline orders and what officers actually served.
City Bureau and ProPublica Illinois Partner on Public Meeting Data
Why City Bureau and ProPublica are partnering on a community tool to make public meeting data more accessible.
How (and Why) We’re Collecting Cook County Jail Data
ProPublica Illinois is restarting a collaborative data collection project to better understand what happens to inmates at Cook County Jail.
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