Making Government Transparent and Accountable
The Sunlight Foundation uses cutting-edge technology and ideas to make government transparent and accountable. Underlying all of our efforts is a fundamental belief that increased transparency will improve the public's confidence in government
The Sunlight Foundation Blog
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FCC Endorsing Open Government
The Federal Communications Commission, in fulfilling their obligation to create broadband plan, is required (pdf) to lay out “a plan for the use of broadband infrastructure and services” in a series of contexts, including civic participation and other national purposes.
As the FCC has prepared their highly anticipated broadband plan (holding a variety of public events), they have heard from a number of transparency advocates, and recognized the role technology has to play in creating a more open, accountable government. (Andrew Rasiej and I testified at an earlier FCC workshop on e-government.)
As the FCC discusses and announces their findings, they seem committed to the sort of government policies that can help turn Internet access into a transformative tool for citizenship. Slides from a Commission meeting on 2/18/10 underscore this comittment:
Increasing the quantity and quality of civic engagement
• Make the federal government more open and transparent
- Release more government data and information on digital platforms
• Create a more robust digital public media ecosystem
- Support public media’s transition to digital platforms for content and delivery
• Engage citizens using online and social media channels
- Implement broadband-enabled tools to increase civic participation
• Engage citizens to increase innovation in government
• Modernize democratic processesWhile they describe the goals in broad terms, this is the sort of commitment necessary for our vision of empowered digital citizenship to become a reality.
Update: Sunlight submitted comments to the FCC to the same effect last June, which can be read here.
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Rebooting the FCC – a major first step
Today the Federal Communications Commission released “reboot the FCC,” an ambitious attempt to “improv[e] citizen interactions with the Federal Communications Commission.” The new website features the FCC’s new agency-wide blog, many new media tools, and an innovative approach to bringing in the public to share ideas on improving the FCC.
The reboot is a significant attempt to instill the principles of openness, collaboration, and participation into everything that the FCC does. It’s not the website redesign that we called for in October — although they are asking for comments and suggestions on upgrading their website — but it is a good step forward towards centering the FCC around citizens.
I’m still discovering new things in the reboot website, including this interesting attempt to pull all of the FCC’s data into one spot. Take a look and let me (and them) know what you think.
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Sunlight Remarks Before the FCC
Sunlight’s John Wonderlich gave remarks before the Federal Communication Commission yesterday. I’m posting his full remarks below:
8/6/09 — Remarks to the Federal Communication Commission
Good Morning. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. My name is John Wonderlich; I am the Policy Director for the Sunlight Foundation, a non-partisan nonprofit dedicated to using the power of the Internet to catalyze greater government transparency.
At the heart of all of the Sunlight Foundation’s work is a deep appreciation for the transformational power of online technology. Our pairing technology with a vision for government transparency is visible in our organization, which digitizes data and creates tools for presenting information, engages communities in advocacy for more information, and makes sure tools and information are in the hands of journalists, citizens, government employees, and everyone in between.
Technology’s role as the driver of disruptive change has become culturally familiar, as our roles as consumers, family members, and businesspeople have evolved over the last few decades. The Internet’s role in shaping governance and citizenship, however, is only just starting to develop. (Continue reading…)
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We Need Your Help With Redesigning the FCC Website
The Sunlight Foundation is building a mock-up redesign of the Federal Communication Commission’s web site, and we need your help. Unlike our previous government website redesign projects — USA.gov, the EPA, the FEC, and the U.S. Supreme Court — we are asking for your ideas first, before we put pen to paper. So tell us what you like, dislike, and would like to see on a re-imagined fcc.gov.
To start off the conversation, we ask that you to focus on big picture issues. What kinds of information are missing from the FCC’s web site? How should its information be organized? How should it be presented? How should it be accessed and downloaded? To what extent should the web site incorporate social media/web 2.0 technology, and how should it be used?
Our discussion will take place in three different locations. Sunlight has two public Google groups, the Open House Project and Sunlight Labs, where you can join and participate. In addition, you can also comment on our introductory blogpost, which is available on the Sunlight Labs blog here.
If you have additional private comments, please contact me. We will read your comments, participate in the conversation, and look forward to drawing upon your ideas to create the mock-up of how the FCC’s site should be improved.
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Broadband and Civic Participation
As part of the economic stimulus package passed in February, Congress gave the Commerce Department up to $7.2 billion to dole out in grants that promote universal high speed internet access. The legislation also required the Federal Communications Commission to submit a national broadband plan to Congress by February 17, 2010, that will “ensure that all people of the United States have access to broadband capability.”
One of the many issues the FCC’s plan is required to address is the use of broadband infrastructure and services to advance civic participation. In April, the FCC asked for comments on what such a broadband plan should look like. A first round of comments was due by June 8, 2009, with a second round of comments due by July 7, 2009.
The Sunlight Foundation submitted comments on what a national broadband plan should look like, focusing on the relationship between increased broadband access and civic participation.
We argue that “changes in how (and what) we can communicate, and the speed with which we can do so, will profoundly reshape our democracy. Universal broadband access, ever-increasing bandwidth, and respect for the basic principles underpinning the internet, such as privacy and network neutrality, will result in greater civic involvement in our democracy and stronger connections to one another.” Increasing government transparency will further catalyze civic participation.
Even with sufficient bandwidth, however, “all users must be able to access the internet,” including those with the least financial means and those living in rural areas.
Read the full comment below.
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The FCC, Ex Parte Communications, and Lobbying for Recovery Funds
Last week, I wrote about the number of agencies complying with President Obama’s memorandum on lobbyist communications related to funds appropriated under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) — the stimulus bill. One of the agencies that came out for the most praise was the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which I said went “beyond the requirements outlined in the March 20th memorandum.” It turns out that there is a reason the FCC does such a good job of presenting lobbyist communications as mandated by the memorandum. The Commission was already required by law to disclose ex parte communications — off-the-record communications — to the public.The reason the FCC is required to disclose certain ex parte communications is due to their status as an independent government body. All independent government commissions have restrictions and disclosure requirements on certain types of off the record communications. For the FCC, their ex parte communication rules involve off the record communications made surrounding certain types of proceedings. For our purposes, an important point is asking why the FCC, and independent government commissions, require rules restricting and/or requiring the disclosure of off the record communications. The Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page on FCC ex parte communications answers this question nicely:
The ex parte rules govern the manner in which persons may communicate with the Commission concerning the issues in its proceedings. The rules play an important role in protecting the fairness of the FCC’s proceedings by assuring that FCC decisions are not influenced by impermissible off-the-record-communications between decision-makers and others. At the same time, the rules are designed to ensure that the FCC has sufficient flexibility to obtain the information that is necessary for it to make reasonable decisions.
This seems to be the exact argument made in support of the ARRA lobbying rules implemented in the March 20 memorandum. Don’t we want to reduce the influence of off-the-record communications in the recovery fund distribution decision-making process? If we do, than some restriction on off-the-record communication, along with strong disclosure of permissable communication would be a perfectly — not to mention tried-and-true — way to obtain that goal. The rules also provide for “sufficient flexibility” for decision-makers to obtain information about potential projects from those seeking funds, without allowing conversations to be held in private.
The rules implemented in the March 20 memorandum may be new to a lot of government workers and lobbyists, but they clearly have their genesis in the ex parte communications rules aimed at reducing outside influence at independent government bodies. Perhaps other agencies should look to those who already have to disclose off-the-record communications for tips on how to disclosure lobbyist contacts.
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Just How Bad Is it?
It looks as if the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) could use Sunlight’s database expertise.
Wired.com writes about a GAO report issued earlier this week that blasts the agency for doing an "appalling job" of tracking, responding and resolving complaints regarding telecommunications services. GAO’s report states:
Limitations in FCC’s current approach for collecting and analyzing enforcement data constitute the principal challenge FCC faces in providing complete and accurate information on its enforcement program… Limitations in FCC’s current approach for collecting and analyzing enforcement data constitute the principal challenge FCC faces in providing complete and accurate information on its enforcement program.
Rep. Ed Markey, chair of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, requested the investigation that focused on the agency’s enforcement efforts between 2003 and 2006.
How bad is it? Bad.
FCC’s enforcement bureau uses five separate databases and "manually searches tens of thousands of paper case files to track and monitor the extent to which each of its divisions takes enforcement action within its statute of limitations requirement for assessing fines or the time it takes to close an enforcement case…The FCC received about 454,000 complaints between 2003 and 2006. The agency responded to most of the complaints with a letter of acknowledgment. It investigated 10 percent of those complaints over those three years, say the GAO…It concluded 39,000 of those investigations –and less than 10 percent of them ended with an enforcement action, according to the GAO…The majority — 83 percent of the investigations — resulted in no enforcement action.
The GAO could not determine why the FCC failed to act on such a high percentage of complaints because the agency fails to systematically collect information on its investigations. GAO’s overall conclusion, Wired.com writes, is that the FCC needs to set itself measurable goals for its enforcement bureau and to develop the tools to more systematically track its enforcement efforts.
You would think that the agency charged with regulating interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite and cable would be significantly more engaged with the tools of the internet age…But I guess not.
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Comcast Blocks Public Access to FCC Hearing
The Federal Communications Commission held a much noted and anticipated hearing in Massachusetts on Monday on the issue of net neutrality. Seating was limited but the hearing was open to the public. Comcast, a foe of net neutrality, decided to take advantage of the limited seating by paying people to sleep in the seats so that net neutrality supporters and others who wanted to watch the hearing would be left outside in the cold. Nice.
In relation to my previous post on coal industry shenanigans, we also need to require disclosure of these types of deceptive practices.
