Every figure traces back to the live payroll record — provenance an editor will accept.
Flags unusual raises and leadership-vs-rank-and-file gaps automatically.
Full career trajectories mean a quiet title change is visible the moment it happens.
See whether a pattern is isolated to one department or citywide.
Payroll data is already public record — no request needed.
Pull the underlying figures into your own reporting workflow.
A reporter covering a city budget hearing wants to know whether a department's leadership pay grew faster than its frontline staff over the last three years. Instead of requesting a records dump and building a spreadsheet from scratch, they search the department in CompensationAtlas, filter by title tier, and have a sourced, citable comparison before the hearing starts.
"The story isn't usually in any single number. It's in the gap between what a title suggests and what the record actually shows."
Permits, licenses, violations, and 311 requests on any block — a running record for a development or neighborhood story.
Where construction investment is concentrating across the city, quarter over quarter — the data behind a growth or displacement piece.
In development — city contracts and vendor payments, connected for accountability reporting.