Chris Zubak-Skees

Software, design and data journalism

I do … data processing & analysis graphics & design apps fun

The Washington Post

2022 election results

My scrapers helped the Post deliver election night predictions, my visualizations helped explain them, data pipelines I worked on helped process FEC data faster and my data analysis informed our coverage.

data processing & analysis

ProPublica

He Tore Down Motels Where Poor Residents Lived During a Housing Crisis

Designed and developed a scrollytelling map of the properties bought by a Reno developer for this investigative project.

graphics & design

STAT

STAT Mobile

Built a mobile app for iOS and Android to showcase STAT's stories and better engage mobile readers. The app lets readers follow their favorite topics and reporters, save stories for later reading and login with their STAT+ account.

apps

Big Local News (open source contributor)

Laid off: 6 million jobs and counting

Built this interactive graphic to showcase data collected by an open source project to scrape layoff notices from states. Contributed open source scrapers to the project for several states as a volunteer.

data processing & analysis graphics & design

Center for Public Integrity & FiveThirtyEight

How ActBlue is trying to turn small donations into a blue wave

Analyzed more than 80 million records in an analysis of Congressional Democratic candidates' reliance on this fundraising platform as it became the de facto way Democrats raise money.

data processing & analysis

Center for Public Integrity

Public financial disclosure parser

Built a tool that helped newsrooms compile databases of Trump officials' financial histories. This was used to report a daily story by the New York Times, to build ProPublica's Trump Town news app and to report an award-winning national radio story with Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting.

data processing & analysis

Personal project

Suggested poems for Gmail

Released on April Fools' Day 2020, this browser extension replaced Gmail’s Smart Replies with lines of poetry. It was enjoyed by many, including Gmail project manager Paul Lambert, who wrote, “This is amazing. I wish we had thought of it!” It was mentioned on Lifehacker and The Verge.

fun

Center for Public Integrity

You donated to kids with cancer. This Vegas telemarketer cashed in.

Analyzed a universe of PACs that raised from small-dollar donors and spent mostly on themselves. Zeroed into one telemarketer's charitable solicitation operation with a reporter. Built graphics to tell the story.

data processing & analysis graphics & design

Center for Public Integrity

Abandoned in America

This was an ambitious multi-part series on the places and people with little political clout. Designed and developed the presentation, as well as overseeing data analysis and graphics production.

graphics & design

Personal project

Can you point to Ukraine on a map?

Created a quick Serverless API and Observable notebook for this interactive knowledge test which asked users to point to Ukraine after a cabinet secretary asked an NPR anchor if she could. It received a million attempts, only 300,000 of which were from bots.

fun

Center for Public Integrity

Women will hold record numbers of elected offices in 2019. See where they made the biggest gains

Charted data on the growth of women's representation in politics in the 50 states as the first state reached gender parity.

graphics & design

Center for Public Integrity

Death in the Trench

Designed the presentation for this striking story on a preventable death and what it says about workplace safety enforcement.

graphics & design

Center for Public Integrity

The invisible hazard afflicting thousands of schools

Analyzed large-scale geospatial data to find schools near busy roads nationwide with data reporter Jamie Smith Hopkins. Built a map to tell the story.

data processing & analysis

Center for Public Integrity

Find your state legislators' financial interests

Helped a reporting team collect, track and input data from nearly every state legislator's financial disclosure in the country, then built an app using DocumentCloud to search and view the disclosures.

apps

Center for Public Integrity

Wilbur Ross will shepherd Trump’s trade policy. Should he also own a shipping firm?

Built a map using Mapbox.js to display millions of ship locations collected by satellites, found a cabinet secretary's shipping firm docked in Iran at the height of sanctions, designed graphics for the resulting story.

data processing & analysis graphics & design