Why we built it
The Philippine Congress has two chambers: a 24-member Senate elected nationwide and a House of Representatives with more than 300 members. Each three-year Congress sees thousands of bills filed. All of this is public record, but it’s spread across two separate chamber websites, each with its own formats and numbering, built mainly for desktop. Most Filipinos get online through their phones.
CivicSync brings those records together in one place that’s easy to search on any device.
What you can do
- Check a lawmaker’s record. See every bill a senator or representative has authored, across both chambers and 13 congresses back to 1987.
- Search both chambers at once. Type a keyword or a bill number however you like: “SB 1294”, “hb4659”, or a topic.
- See where a bill is now. Current status, the committee it’s in, and a plain-language summary, with links to the official record.
- Follow bills you care about. Bookmark them to your Watchlist. No account needed.
Where the data comes from
CivicSync is built on open civic data. Lawmaker profiles and authorship history come from BetterGov’s Open Congress API. Live status, committee referrals, plain-language summaries, and recent 20th Congress bills come from BatasWatch, an independent bill tracker. The summaries are automated and labelled as such.
What CivicSync is not
CivicSync is independent and non-partisan, and is not affiliated with the Senate, the House of Representatives, or any government agency. It’s a guide to the official record, not a replacement for it. Always verify important details at senate.gov.ph and congress.gov.ph.
Who’s behind it
CivicSync PH is built by HelloJoal, an independent developer. The source code is public on GitHub.
Your privacy
CivicSync is privacy first. You don’t need an account, and your Watchlist is saved only on your device. If you want it on your other devices too, you can sign in with Google to sync it. The only other time we store anything about you is if you choose to send us a form, like joining the translator list; we use it only to reply to you, and delete it on request. We count visits anonymously, without cookies, to see which pages are useful. We never sell data or track you across other sites.
Open source
CivicSync is open source under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 (AGPL-3.0). Anyone can read, reuse, and improve the code. If someone runs a modified version for the public, they must share their changes too, so improvements to civic tools stay public. The licence covers our code; legislative data belongs to its sources.
Organisations that can’t meet the AGPL’s terms, for example to build CivicSync into a closed-source product, can ask about a commercial licence. Licence fees help fund CivicSync’s development.
Help shape it
CivicSync is free and still growing. Questions, ideas, or spotted a problem? Email hello.joaldev@gmail.com. Want to do more? See ways to get involved. Journalists can find logos, screenshots, and a fact sheet in the press kit.