Sometimes it's difficult to tell if your legislator is there with you on issues that matter to you but Project Vote Smart gives a pretty good indicator of where they are on social issues.

Fiscal and community issues are a completely different story.

The problem with PVS is that they leave it up to the special interests groups to rank your legislators.  You also can't just assume that because you would tend to agree or disagree with a certain group all the time.  It requires a little research and for you to find out what questions they asked.

Some legislators also make it difficult for PVS to inform their readers.  Take the case of State Senator Alberta Darling.  Her profile reads: 

SENATOR ALBERTA DARLING REPEATEDLY REFUSED TO PROVIDE ANY
RESPONSES TO CITIZENS ON ISSUES THROUGH THE 2004
NATIONAL POLITICAL AWARENESS TEST

SENATOR ALBERTA DARLING REFUSED TO PROVIDE THIS INFORMATION WHEN ASKED TO DO SO BY:
Major News Organizations
and key national leaders of both parties including,

John McCain, Republican Senator
Geraldine Ferraro, Former Democratic Congresswoman
Michael Dukakis, Former Democratic Governor
Bill Frenzel, Former Republican Congressman
Richard Kimball, Project Vote Smart President

Why would she refuse to answer questions? 

You can also find some issues that would seem strange to you until you knew a little background.  Here's an example –  why would Darling get a rank of 0 (zero) from Planned Parenthood?  If you knew about Darling's background you would know that she once served on the Planned Parenthood Board of Directors.  She was once pro-choice. 

What happened? 

Here's the part that PVS doesn't tell you about.  Far right Republicans started to pick off her friends.  Her good friend, Mary Panzer who was seen as a moderate was ousted after a long and distinguished career in the State Senate.  But Panzer wasn't just another Senator, she was her party's leader in the Senate.  Panzer had a reputation working and playing well with others and she was branded by extremists in her own party as a RINO (Republican in name only).  Darling had the same sort of voting record but she made a dramatic shift to the right after seeing her friend Panzer get recalled. 

Was it right?  No.  There was no excuse for it.  Recalling Panzer was a shameful act and an abuse of a state law.  Other states require malfeasance in office and in Georgia, you must even prove malfeasance in front of a Judge before a recall can move forward.

But back to Project Vote Smart — you have to think of it as a tool but it is an imprecise tool that doesn't give you the full picture.