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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Grace and Brilliance Under Fire in Albany
The New York State Senate’s chief information officer Andrew Hoppin and his team have been making tremendous strides in opening up the inner workings of the chamber to the public, and are well on their way to achieving levels of transparency and accountability not before seen by any American legislative body, state or federal.
That in and of itself is worthy of great praise. However, they are fulfilling their mission while pitched partisan warfare is being waged over who controls the chamber. Not knowing who your boss is and whether you’ll have a job tomorrow is undoubtedly distracting, to say the least. But as Craig Newmark, wrote on his blog, “Looks like they’re getting it done, despite all the drama in NY state politics.” Earlier this week, The New York Observer’s Gillian Reagan highlighted the work of Hoppin and his team revamping the Senate’s Web site and services in order to “bring back-door conversations and government data and empower constituents.”
Last month, I blogged about how the NY Senate is building an array of online services that will offer citizens a much clearer window into how the chamber functions and invites their participation, including information such as bill text, budget plans and lawmaker’s expenditures and funding reports. It includes a public database of legislation that’s searchable by bill number, sponsor, committee or keyword. And they’ve added a Plain Language Initiative that translates legal and political jargon into more readable text. 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, in essence a New York version of Sunlight’s Public Markup.Note that they are using a Creative Commons license. (Sunlight’s senior technology advisors, Andrew Rasiej and Micah Sifry, are advising the Senate on their transparency redesign.)
This is really great work under the most challenging of political circumstances.
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GOP Takes a Stand for Transparency
There’s a bit of irony in this story.
House Republican leaders are calling for Democrats to post the stimulus bill, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, online immediately. In a letter sent to Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, the GOP leaders write that having the bill online would allow citizens to study its contents before Congress agrees to it and the president signs it into law. The GOP leadership is correct to, on behalf of the American people, claim the right “to see each provision of this legislation and evaluate the merit of each dollar of government spending their children and grandchildren are being required to fund.”
Too bad they haven’t always been for such transparency.
Since inception, Sunlight has been calling for exactly this sort of openness. We think all legislation should be posted on line for 72 hours before debate. We’re hoping now that alot of Republicans will sign onto this measure when it’s reintroduced in this Congress.
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WriteToReply.org
Last week, Stephen Carter, the U.K. government’s minister for communications, technology and broadcasting, released an interim report on the state of Britain’s digital capacity with recommendations for enhancements. The report, “Digital Britain – Interim Report,” is the result of a review Carter launched in October with the mandate of providing a comprehensive analysis of Britain’s digital economy.
Bill Thompson, BBC technology columnist, criticized Carter and his agency for producing a report lacking public engagement and that “reflects an approach based around control and secrecy.” Thompson points out that it’s 72 pages into the report before the authors added an invitation with an email address (digitalbritain@berr.gsi.gov.uk) for interested citizens and organizations to offer suggestions and join the discussion. Thompson added that it would be up to Carter and his Digital Britain team to follow up on these expressions of interest, “which is nice of them, and we must just hope that Carter and his expert panel will be carefully reviewing every blog post and online comment to ensure they don’t miss anything important.”
