Some argue for more “Sunshine” in government as if transparency is a positive onto itself. It is not. Transparency matters because it guarantees access to information that empowers every citizen to hold government officials accountable for the conduct of the publics’ business and the spending of taxpayers’ money. Official accountability to the citizen is the great positive; the corner stone of self government and liberty.

Sunshine matters because without transparency there can be no accountability. And, without accountability, there is no self government. Without accountability, government of the people is government over the people.

The opportunities for government transparency have never been greater. The Internet allows direct, low cost access to virtually unlimited quantities of documents and data, while an array of telecommunications devices can instantly transmit information to millions of citizens simultaneously. But for all the power of these technologies, government cannot be fully transparent—and thus accountable—unless disclosure is de rigueur.

Freedom of Information Act laws do facilitate a degree of citizen scrutiny. But government agencies easily exploit a variety of FOIA loopholes, and even the savviest citizens can be stymied by the convoluted requirements. Thus, government at every level must be forced to provide citizens ready access to all budgets, contracts, audits, permits, meeting minutes and the like. It is entirely reasonable to expect that such “affirmative disclosure” should be no less stringent than the multifarious disclosure demands government imposes on taxpayers.

Many states, counties, cities and school districts come up short in providing an appropriate level of transparency. For example, California’s budget site does not disclose line item expenditures, grants, state contracts, or employee compensation data. Massachusetts has no online database of state spending. New York posts its financial reports online, but in a PDF format that is not searchable.

A useful method of evaluating government Web sites—a 10-point “Transparency Checklist” —has been developed by Sunshine Review, a wiki platform for measuring government Web content against what should be available. As noted on the Sunshine Review Web site (www.SunshineReview.org), “We shouldn’t have to ask the government for permission to be an informed citizen.”

Michael Barnhart, Sunshine Review
mbarnhart@sunshinereview.org

A couple of few interesting updates…

* Our friends at Americans for Tax Reform posted a strong admonishment to Arizona Governor Jan Brewer and state Senate President Bob Burns on the ATR blog this morning. Burns recently discharged Senator Thayer Verschoor (R-Gilbert) and Senate Majority Whip Pamela Gorman (R-Anthem) from their leadership positions after the senators voted against the Governor’s ill-advised legislation to increase AZ’s sales tax. Americans for Tax Reform set up an action page citizens can visit to speak out against the tax hike.

* Bob Weeks over at Voice for Liberty in Wichita points out that Sedgwick County, Kansas has placed its check register online. Inquiring minds can sort data by function, category, fund, or vendor.

**MORE UPDATES!!!**

* The Ocean State Policy Research Institute is tracking RI stimulus spending through their newest website, RIStimulus.org.

* Duval County celebrated its “A-” rating from SunshineReview.org, which was the highest grade given in the state of Florida, and the only county that had complete information about lobbyists on its Web site. Only one Florida county, Suwannee County, should be embarrassed by not having a web presence.

In an effort to educate those wishing to take a closer look at local government, Dr. Fusco, former superintendent in Branford, Connecticut put together a manual on forming a Citizen’s Audit Committee (CAC).

Dr. Fusco’s work in combination with the Yankee Institute reinforces the need to form citizen committees in order to tackle larger problems within local and state government. Too often investigative citizens tackle issues as single units but there are huge benefits of combining efforts. Simply put, more ground can be covered than any one individual is able to accomplish, especially when dealing with the complexities of local governments or school boards.

“A Citizens Audit Committee can do what school boards and town officials are either unwilling to do for political reasons or unable to do because of a lack of skill, information, and time.”

An additional benefit of CACs is that they will provide, “independent and objective oversight to budgeting and spending practices by assessing whether there is efficiency or effectiveness.”

This document was also written in order to help explain confusing terminology, which often is where concerned taxpayers end up hitting a roadblock. Even motivated individuals can get tripped up with the jargon used in many of the government forms.

The report also provides strategies of where to begin to look for discrepancies and then ultimately what citizens should do once they have found meaningful data. Reaching those who can utilize the findings becomes the next important step so that problems can be amended and preventative measures can be put in place for the future.

Through the efforts of the Yankee Institute more citizens will have the tools to effectively expose problems that exist in public offices and combat corruption by alerting those who pay for it- the everyday taxpayer.

Corporate bailouts have been in the news as of late, but how about personal bailouts? Well, Charles Flowers, the superintendent of the Suburban Cook County Regional Office of Education was found recently to be skimming the district’s cash account when his paychecks just were not enough. Oh yeah, and this scheme also included his two sisters and nephew.
Phil Kadner of the Southtown Star reported that

Less that a year after his election, he approved a $6,000 cash to his sister Barbara Flowers. “These repayments were to occur each pay period stating on April 4th 2008.”

When the state auditor general became involved it was found and reported that, “the payroll register does not show any repayments between this date [April 4, 2008] and June 30, 2008.” This money, paid out illegally, and unbeknownst to the taxpayers, was used for various personal purchases whose receipts have conveniently been hard to locate. When asked about the allegations of theft, Dr. Flowers claimed that the bills were “repaid from his personal bank account.” Apparently the money was taken and paid back, all without proper documentation that would come with having the receipts on hand. No harm right? It will be interesting to see what the Illinois State’s Attorney will think of that story.

When it is all said and done, I think it’s safe to say that the taxpayers of greater Suburban Cook County will be calling for greater transparency within the district’s expansive public budget.
Actions that Cook County taxpayers will likely call for might mirror the measures that just have been enacted in Freeland and Bullock Creek schools in Michigan. These two schools are the first in the state to post their checkbook registers online as part of a ‘Show Michigan the Money’ statewide transparency project by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.

Ultimately, something tells me that this will not be the last case of abuse we hear of within the public school systems in Illinois. This will especially be the case if the budgets become available to a wider range of taxpayers and watchdogs interested in where their money goes; both for planned projects and anything illegal in nature that might be going on.

Here are a few transparency updates from around the nation.

* ILLINOIS: The Chicago Tribune started an Open Records help desk to display “Strategy, help and stories about getting public information in Illinois”. Good move from the Trib, since Chicago’s Mayor Daley routinely denies FOIA requests.

Another IL piece worth reading is the Mill Creek Times’ analysis of its local government website. It mentions that Mill Creek Special Service Area is “absolutely deficient” when graded on the standards set forth in the Sunshine Review checklist.

* MICHIGAN: The Clare Sentinel published an excellent letter to the editor titled, “Grandmother spearheads transparency effort to put school district check registers online.” The letter demonstrates that school transparency is much easier than most people think. It takes just minutes per day!

* OKLAHOMA: Oklahomans for Responsible Government, a fiscal watchdog group, lamented the lack of county transparency in the Sooner State, and revealed their new transparency initiative regarding school districts.

* TENNESSEE: Governor Phil Bredesen announced a new website, TN.gov, that increases transparency by listing vendor payments and employee travel reimbursements and salaries.

* FEDERAL: President Obama is working to roll back union transparency laws. According to the Heritage Foundation, these regulations make union officials more accountable to union members and deter fraud and embezzlement.

When is a government website NOT a government website? Michael Quinn Sullivan from Empower Texans reports:

The Oklahoman printed an op-ed by Brian Downs from Oklahomans for Responsible Government that advocated greater transparency at both the state and local government. They even cited SunshineReview.org, which sets a standard level of transparency for government websites.

Right now, Oklahoma posts much of its spending online through the Office of State Finance. But according to the Web site SunshineReview.org, Oklahoma lacks two of the six criteria for evaluating spending Web sites: contracts and line-item expenditures. Missouri is the only state that meets all six criteria. Oklahoma lawmakers should push to make our state a leader in transparency.

On the local level, Oklahoma falls behind most states in even the lowest forms of transparency. Of the state’s 77 counties, 48 have no Web site at all. Of those that do, only Payne and Rogers counties have their full budgets posted online. Clearly more needs to be done to make local governments more transparent.

In difficult economic times, transparency is an easy answer to make sure taxpayers are getting enough bang for their buck. Groups like Oklahomans for Responsible Government, Americans for Prosperity-OK, and Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs are doing their part to remind government officials of that priority.

Related: Check out Oklahoma’s Open Books website.

Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn is a known crusader against wasteful, secret, and pork-barrel spending and earmarks. He did the nation a favor this week when he posted an Omnibus Highlights and Numbers section on his website.

Interesting facts about this legislation:

Total Spending in the Omnibus:
According to CBO, the omnibus will cost $410 billion, $32 billion (8.4%) more than FY 2008 spending. The legislation is 1,128 pages long. Each page is equal to $363 million in spending.

Excluding emergency appropriations, the bill is:
• $19 billion (4.9%) more than President Bush’s request
• $19 billion (4.9% more than the cost of extending the continuing resolution
• $32 billion (8.4%) more than last year

Earmarks:
Total omnibus earmarks: 8,570
Total cost: $7.7 billion

The three previously enacted FY 2009 spending bills included a total of 2,321 earmarks, costing $6.6 billion.

Total FY 2009 earmarks: 10,891
Total FY 2009 earmark spending: $14.3 billion

Good grief.

H/T: Oklahoma Center for Public Affairs- compiled list of earmarks

Also… as a plug for our friends at American Majority, Senator Coburn is the keynote speaker at a special dinner on March 27th. I hope you will join me in supporting American Majority’s mission of recruiting activists that believe in fiscal restraint. Sen. Coburn could use some back-up!

In an interview with David Gregory on Meet the Press, Governor Bobby Jindal states he is not accepting his entire cut of the stimulus package in order to keep Louisiana competitive. Also, he does not philosophically agree with the stimulus package. He advocates for more tax cuts and “targeted temporary spending”.

Jindal emphasizes that the best way to grow the economy is through tax cuts.

“I think we just have a fundamental disagreement here. I don’t think the best way to do that is for the government to tax and borrow more money. I think the best thing they could’ve done, for example, was to cut taxes on things like capital gains, the lower tax brackets, to get the private sector spending again.”

He questions how certain spending project in the bill will even stimulate the economy.

“What would be more helpful from Washington is less unnecessary spending. How does $300 million for federal cars, $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts, how is spending like that going to help our economy? How’s that stimulus?”

Governor Jindal rejected stimulus dollars for unemployment insurance because it would result in raising taxes on businesses.

“The $100 million we turned down was temporary federal dollars that would require us to change our unemployment laws. That would’ve actually raised taxes on Louisiana businesses. We as a state would’ve been responsible for paying for those benefits after the federal money disappeared.”

Today, Cook County Board member Tony Peraica called for spending transparency for Cook County, Illinois.

John Tillman, President of the Illinois Policy Institute, accurately stated:

Cook County government has been on a relentless mission to continually raise taxes. People have been abandoning Cook County for decades due to its high taxes and reputation for corruption and bloated payrolls. Transparency is a first step toward reform. It is the x-ray machine that will allow the citizens of Cook County to see every check written, for how much and to whom. More is needed, but this is an excellent first step.

Other things to throw up on the Cook County website are lobbying contracts and information on how to file a Freedom of Information Act request.