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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The Irony and the Solution of Lobbying Disclosures
If you read Monday’s New York Times story about how many lobbyists are de-registering in the face of new filing requirements and how some may still be lobbying without technically violating the law, I can understand if you came away confused about a) the general value of transparency, b) the effectiveness of making lobbyists disclose their activities and c) my own role as a one-time lobbyist for Sunlight, since the reporter used my own personal experience as the peg for his story. I suppose the point was to suggest some kind of irony—transparency advocate hiding her activities from the public? Well, let me give you some more background than was included in the Times piece.
Although not required by law, when Sunlight was founded in 2006, I registered as a lobbyist to demonstrate that the public good is served by lobbying disclosure. I didn’t have to do this since I was at most spending 2-3% of my time meeting Members of Congress or their staff, and the law only requires people who spend more than 20% of their time on lobbying to register. But, since I was occasionally having meetings on Capitol Hill to discuss our transparency agenda, I thought I should err on the side of more rather than less disclosure. I still believe that but I figured out pretty quickly how meaningless current lobbying disclosure law is – I was never asked who I met with, what I discussed in my meetings, or even how much time I spent with a lawmaker or her staff. The information I filled out didn’t really tell anyone anything substantial. There was little real public good served. Anyway, I had almost nothing to report—perhaps a handful of meetings at most.
Then along came the Obama Transition team with their strong disposition against holding meetings with registered lobbyists. Talk about irony. For the first time in my decades in Washington I actually found an Administration sympathetic to my long-held agenda about government transparency. The last thing I wanted to do was have being a registered lobbyist become a barrier to talking to the administration about improving transparency. So, since I was under no legal obligation to register (because I spent so little time on Capitol Hill directly), I deregistered in the last quarter of 2008. (Sunlight has two registered lobbyists on staff – John Wonderlich, our Policy Director and Nisha Thompson, our online organizer. Our third lobbyist is Lisa Rosenberg who is a consultant to us.)
This might look like a case of perverse consequences—tougher rules against lobbyists leading someone who was doing a modest amount of lobbying to unregister as a lobbyist in order to have more lobbying-type conversations with decision makers! But here’s the point: When I was registered, the filing requirements were so weak you had no idea who I talked to on the Hill or in the White House, what I talked to them about, or what my positions were. Lobbyist registration and disclosure as it is currently structured is pretty much a joke. All kinds of people in and around Washington buy and sell influence over the process; the 14,000 registered lobbyists are just the tip and shoulder of the iceberg. Big campaign contributors, corporate and union executives, celebrities, and my favorite, “strategic advisors” like Tom Daschle who use their long careers in Congress to guide lobbying firms without actually going up to the Hill to lobby themselves, are all players in the influence-peddling business. The current disclosure laws—which exempt anyone who spends less than 20% of their time lobbying—hide more than they expose.
So let me state here and now. When, as we advocate, the lobbying disclosure laws are reformed to cover all lobbying, and require prompt disclosure of who is lobbying whom for what and for how much, I’ll be the first to sign up.
Our lobbying laws should be detailed and timely enough to keep pace with the influence peddling they are designed to track. We need to amend the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 (LDA) to require that all individuals engaging in direct issue advocacy with lawmakers, staff and the executive branch, as well as those who bundle campaign contributions to federal candidates above a threshold amount must report within 72 hours of their first lobbying contact under the LDA. If you lobby, you lobby. No more of this ridiculous 20 percent exemption.
All registrants should be required to disclose all legislative contacts with a member of Congress, staff or executive branch employee. Disclosure should include all legislation and regulations discussed and all requests for specific services or government funding. Right now the reporting is so general you have no idea who lobbyists are actually meeting with, or what is being discussed.
All legislative contacts should be reported within 24 hours of any meeting. A reporting template should be set up so that we can report from our iPhones and Blackberrys. Reporting lobby contacts should be a simple and seamless as texting.
And finally, all campaign contributions made and bundled by lobbyists should be reported within 24 hours of being made. All such disclosures should be made electronically, published promptly and maintained online in a downloadable, searchable, sortable format.
And the White House needs to get real. Real time, on line transparency is key to holding lobbyists at bay—not bans on one group of special pleaders while another group gets to waltz in and out of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
Who else wants to sign up with me?
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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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Weekly Media Roundup – May 8, 2009
Today, May 8th, marks the 125th birthday of Harry S Truman, our 33rd president. He once said, “Secrecy and a free, democratic government don’t mix.” Amen, Mr. President.
Here are a few of the more interesting media mentions of Sunlight and our friends and grantees from this week:
Monday morning, Tom Lee, a technology director at Sunlight, appeared on C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal” taking questions about Recovery.gov, the Web site set up to track spending under the federal government’s economic stimulus program. Tom is working on SubsidyScope, a project of The Pew Charitable Trusts, that looks at the role of federal subsidies in the economy. Below is the video of the segment:
Speaking of Recovery.gov, Matt Kelley with USA Today reported that the Web site won’t have details on contracts and grants until October and may not be complete until next spring — halfway through the program. Kelley quotes Greg Elin, Sunlight’s chief evangelist, saying people accustomed to getting easily searchable information quickly could be frustrated. “If we have to wait until October to get the information or to the end of the year to get a powerful recovery.gov site, the Obama administration will have missed an important opportunity.”
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The Dawning of Empire State Transparency
Within the past week, the New York State Senate has taken some impressive steps toward conducting its business open and online. Earlier today, the Senate launched its new Web site that offers citizens a much clearer window into how the chamber functions and invites their participation. The site now includes a weekly calendar, “What’s happening now?” and “Find my senator” functions, info on senators, a listing of committees, data on issues and legislation, photos and videos and a blog. One aspect I find especially cool is the Markup function that allows the public to comment on legislation that is under consideration. This function is a New York version of Sunlight’s Public Markup. (Sunlight’s senior technology advisors, Andrew Rasiej and Micah Sifry, are advising the Senate on their transparency redesign.) And here’s a link to an article from The New York Observer about the launch.
Here’s a short video of Malcolm A. Smith, Senate majority leader, introducing the site:
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Weekly Media Roundup – May 1, 2009
Here are a few of the more interesting media mentions of Sunlight and our friends and grantees from this week:David Herbert with the National Journal (subscription required) wrote about the grades new media experts from across the political spectrum gave the Obama administration’s Web presence. The experts gave WhiteHouse.gov an average grade of C+. Although they mostly see it as an improvement from the previous administration’s site, many noted that it remained a one-way forum and suggested it be opened to allow comments and other interactive features. Herbert quotes Ellen Miller, Sunlight’s executive director, “This occasional use of interactive tools” is impressive, but “90 percent of the time the site is pretty straightforward, as it was under [George W.] Bush.” Recovery.gov, the administration’s site where citizens can monitor the expenditure and use of recovery funds, fared even worse in the Journal’s poll, averaging a C. The most common gripe about the site, Herbert writes, is that it’s “the view from 30,000 feet,” as Micah Sifry, senior technology advisor for Sunlight and Personal Democracy Forum (PDF) co-founder, told him. Without providing on-the-the ground details, Recovery.gov offers taxpayers few tools for staying on top of where their money is going, reviewers said. Recovery.gov has competition in the form of privately-operated Recovery.org, which has “more granular data and a real search tool, which one assumes we’ll eventually see on Recovery.gov,” Micah explains. “I don’t think it’s fair to compare this site to other Web sites yet, as it’s just weeks old,” Micah added. “Let’s take another look in three to six months, OK?”
Chris Lefkow with Agence France-Presse gained a different take by interviewing academics, technology analysts and nonpartisan groups on the administration’s technology efforts. Lefkow writes that they all said the first “tech president” is off to a good start. Lefkow quotes John Wonderlich, Sunlight’s policy director, “their first pronouncements are very encouraging,” and added that the challenge, however, is going to be the implementation. Andrew Resiej, Sunlight’s other senior technology advisor and PDF co-founder, said the administration been doing as much as it can to fulfill its promises in regards to transparency and technological innovation. “However they’ve been constrained by decades of industrial-age rules and regulations and procurement protocols that are handicapping the speed at which they can implement that vision,” he said.
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Open House Project Poetry Slam
Here’s a little fun for your weekend. Yesterday, the Open House Google Group turned into an outright poetry slam.
David Weller kicked it all off with this submission titled “Government data” …
Info, not information
Data, now, well, data?
Databases galore
Needing some moreGovernment info
Is data consumed
The truth as we know it
Can I make a profit?Then Joshua Gay added “Three Haikus for Internet Transparency and Change in 2009” …
“I will execute…”–
Ha! WhiteHouse.gov launched
already–Haha!I see my shadow
on recovery.gov,
Punxsutawney Phil.Good start, kind of. Now,
make sure we can read the bills–
that is, all of US!Not to be outdone, GovTrack.us’ Josh Tauberer added this limerick…
There once was a man named Mike Honda,
A congressman us geeks are quite fond ‘a,
In markup sessions takes on the chairman, a hulk,
so that we the people can get our data in bulk.His friend maverick Joe likes transparency too,
Senate votes in XML he says long overdue,
At party politics he snorts,
Because the public should see those CRS reports.And last we hear of the executive’s new plan,
For a CTO and CIO…
…perhaps YesWeScan?And to top it all off, Sunlight’s John Wonderlich added what he called “An old haiku”…
Opening Congress
blog net nerds bring scrutiny,
Sunlight Foundationand a new limerick:
The power that sprang not from Kings,
but the merit the populace brings,
thrives on data and docs,
not closed doors with locked locks.
Online access gives ideas new wings.I always knew the open government movement was full of talented people…But they never cease to amaze.
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Help Sunlight Open Up the Senate
Building on the achievements of the Open House Project, today we are launching a parallel initiative, the Open Senate Project. This bipartisan, collaborative project will study the Senate’s current information-sharing practices to recommend how to improve public access to the Senate’s work on the Web.
We hope that you to join us in figuring out what technological reforms we should recommend to the Senate so it can make its work more accessible and user-friendly online. You can do that by subscribing to Google group listed on the top right-hand corner of the Open Senate Project’s homepage. Through that online group, we’ll have an ongoing conversation and collaborative preparation of our recommendations.
John Wonderlich, program director for the Sunlight Foundation, will lead the effort in collaboration with project coordinators Josh Tauberer, creator of the nonpartisan Web site GovTrack.us, and Jon Henke, a former Senate staffer who now blogs at TheNextRight.com.
As John blogged recently, with your help, the Open House Project was successful in jumpstarting a public discussion that prompted the House of Representatives to make its work available online in new ways, including releasing legislative data in more user-friendly formats and establishing new rules that allow lawmakers to use Web services like YouTube and Twitter to communicate with their constituents.
But, we can’t do it without you. Together, we can open the Senate.
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Your Late Night Reading: CRS reports Courtesy of OpenCRS.com
Poor John. He can’t quite get over his late night work habits. (Before he came to Sunlight to direct our Open House Project he worked a day job and indulged his fascination with politics between the hours of 10 PM and 4 AM).
Last night at 2 AM he sent this email:
I just finished reading the latest CRS report from August 26th on Congress and the Internet, linked in the latest Open House Project report, and was delighted to find that Sunlight and the Open House Project are specifically cited by Walter Oleszek (senior government analyst for CRS) for our work in promoting citizen access.
That it was Oleszek’s report was particularly satisfying for me, since reading several of his introductory books on Congress (Congressional Procedures and the Policy Process, and Congress and Its Members) is what got me quasi proficient enough to get started.
John has some more extensive thoughts this morning.
Too funny things. We wouldn’t have known of this report if it hadn’t appeared on OpenCRS.org (a Sunlight grantee.) And it was Oleszek’s early books that educated me too. (Makes you wonder how many other people learned what they know about Congress from him too!)
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The Open House Project at Heritage
This morning the Heritage Foundation hosted a terrific panel of the primary conveners of the Sunlight sponsored Open House Project – John Wonderlich, Rob Bluey, Matt Stoller and David All. And while the conversation touched on some of the specific recommendations of the work, it was mostly a very articulate and thoughtful musing by the four 20-something leaders of the effort about how they marshaled the online collaborative effort across a sharp political divide on bringing the House into the 21st century. The genuine bipartisanship was hated by one right-wing blogger, but was defended by two of the conveners — Rob Bluey and David All. Can't wait to hear what Stoller has to say.
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Open House Project is Well Underway
I spent part of the weekend following the very smart conversation that has already begun on the listserv that is forming the core of the collaborative effort for our new Open House Project. I used to consider myself a kind of Congressional process geek (to wit I spent part o the weekend reading the many posts on this listserv), but the folks participating in this collaborative bipartisan effort to study how the House currently integrates the Internet into its operations, so it can make recommendations to the leadership on how to do it better, have an amazing breadth of knowledge.
The participants in this project are meeting online via listserv, blog and wiki. The project's being led by Matt Stoller (of MyDD.com) and John Wonderlich (lead coordinator of the Congressional Committees Project on DailyKos) with Sunlight's senior strategists Andrew Rasiej and Micah Sifry providing ongoing support.
The bipartisan group includes some very smart people, including renowned technologist Clay Shirky, Bush/Cheney 2004 eCampaign Director Mike Turk, Govtrack creator Joshua Tauberer, and leading blogger Markos Moulitsas-Zuniga of the Daily Kos. These folks will regularly talk with leaders in congressional process and the Internet. Citizens will be asked for their assistance in creating consensus on short-term reforms that can be implemented in the House. Our goal is to have a report ready to be present to Speaker Nancy Pelosi in March.
Here's an oportunity to take what you know (or what you think) about how Congress should make itself more transparent and get involved.
