NV stimulus website rockets to middle of the pack

We're #1 #25! We're #1 #25! Go Nevada! Woo-hoo!

I guess when you languish near the bottom, any move towards the top is a good thing.

Nevada has improved its stimulus web site enough to earn it a ranking of 25th in the country, a significant improvement from six months ago when it was rated by a Washington D.C. advocacy group as one of the worst sites in the country.

The report gives Nevada's stimulus website full points in two categories (spending by program areas and recipient jobs data), partial points in two categories (contract/grant details and user aids) and zero points in three categories (spending by county, spending compared to economic distress and mapping of contract and grant projects). It gives the website 42 points out of a possible 100.

Our ranking still isn't great, but it is a welcome improvement. Hopefully in the coming months it'll become more refined and useful and -- knock on wood with your crossed fingers -- break into the top 10!

(Thanks Anjeanette Damon)

Mike Montandon's funny money

Score one for campaign disclosure laws:

Republican gubernatorial hopeful Mike Montandon accepted a $10,000 donation from a foreign company last year, a violation of federal campaign finance law.

The former three-term North Las Vegas mayor said Tuesday that he will return the donation, after the Las Vegas Sun flagged it and others on a recent finance report that appeared to be from foreign sources. The contribution was one of five from Hong Kong-based donors identified in the newspaper’s analysis of gubernatorial campaign finance reports last week.

Without strong and robust disclosure laws, illegal campaign contributions like this could slip by unnoticed.

Given Nevada's terrible record on campaign disclosure laws, it is amazing this was discovered at all:

In 2008 Nevada ranked 45th among the states in public disclosure efforts, according to the Campaign Disclosure Project, a joint effort from the UCLA School of Law, the Center for Governmental Studies, and the California Voter Foundation. Nevada was one of 10 states last year that received an “F” from the group based on the adequacy of its campaign disclosure laws, thoroughness of its electronic filing program and accessibility of disclosures, including online resources.

But, in this case at least, the system did work. Hopefully this serves as a lesson to other politicians.

TransparentNevada Keeping a Close Eye on Congress

(NPRI) – Are federal taxpayer dollars going to political consultants working to re-elect first-term Nevada Congresswoman Dina Titus?

That’s just one of many questions raised by official new data from the U.S. Congress, now easily available to the public at TransparentNevada.com. Released to the public by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the data shows the office spending of Nevada’s U.S. representatives for last year’s third quarter.

While spending for office printing and reproduction by representatives Dean Heller and Shelley Berkley was $302 and $1,741, respectively, Nevada District 3’s new congresswoman, Dina Titus, spent $34,410, according to the report from the House of Representatives’ Chief Administration Officer.

Drilling down further into the data reveals by far the biggest item: a $29,000 payment to Erwin and Muir, a Bay Area political consulting and public affairs firm.

Andrew Stoddard, a Titus spokesman contacted via e-mail, declined to explain or directly address the payment to Erwin and Muir, but did reply that:

"Congresswoman Titus’ job is to represent the people of the Third District and be a powerful voice on their behalf. In order to do so, she utilizes a number of tools to stay in contact with Southern Nevadans, from Congress on the Corner and town halls to updates on her work in Congress and surveys on issue of importance. These mailings provide an opportunity to inform the people of District Three, the most populous district in the country with nearly 1 million residents, about the critical work going on in Washington as well as listen to their feedback on issues that are being debated in Congress."

Stoddard added, “Everything that is sent out is approved by the bipartisan Congressional Franking Commission to ensure that the communication is appropriate and not campaign related or political.”

Such mass mailings, known as “franked mail” — from the Latin word francus, meaning “free” (to members of Congress) — have long been a point of contention for good-government advocates, who acknowledge the need for elected representatives to reach out to their constituents but worry about possible abuses of taxpayer-financed publicity.

As Mary Boyle, a spokeswoman for Common Cause, said in a 2007 case, “We certainly hope the frank is being spent on solid communications with voters, and not being used as a thinly guised campaign ad.”

Full spending reports for the quarter for all three Nevada representatives can be found at http://transparentnevada.com/disbursements/2009/Q3/. As new data (officially known as the congressional “statement of disbursements”) is made available by the House, the site will be updated. Senate office data will be added when that chamber begins posting its data.

Since 1964, Congress has been required by law to publish a quarterly public report of all receipts and expenditures for Members of Congress, Committees, Leadership, House Officers and Offices of the House of Representatives. The physical report — traditionally bound in three volumes with over 3,000 pages — was, for the first time in December 2009, made available to the public in digital PDF form.

The Sunlight Foundation, a leading transparency-focused non-profit, then made the data available to the wider public in formats appropriate for search.

Also now featured on TransparentNevada are:

• Salary information on employees at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Covering 3,212 employees in 191 departments, this feature is a comprehensive and searchable database that allows regular citizens the ability to see exactly who is getting paid what at UNLV. Visitors can find the salaries at http://transparentnevada.com/unlv/.


• The Clark County School District’s recent report to the Nevada Legislature on its expenditures for consultants. The data can be sorted by several different columns: name of vendor, purpose of contract, amount paid, start date, end date or the fund from which the district pays the contract.


• Multiple other improvements to TransparentNevada.com have been implemented in the past few months. The website now features 2008 salary data from numerous counties along with the existing 2007 data numbers. A re-designed interface allows for easier navigation, and a revamped search feature is faster and more powerful. Additional improvements are on the way.

"The mission of TransparentNevada is to bring accountability and openness to the most powerful institution in society – government," said Steven Miller, vice president for policy at the Nevada Policy Research Institute, which operates TransparentNevada as a public service. "Citizens and taxpayers deserve to know how and where their hard-earned money is being spent, and we at NPRI are committed to making that information available."

Policy and Process

Of all the reaction to Scott Brown's election last night, Sen. Webb hit the nail on the head with this:

"In many ways the campaign in Massachusetts became a referendum not only on health care reform but also on the openness and integrity of our government process. It is vital that we restore the respect of the American people in our system of government and in our leaders. To that end, I believe it would only be fair and prudent that we suspend further votes on health care legislation until Senator-elect Brown is seated." (Emphasis mine)

The Massachusetts Senate race was about health care, but also about the process that designed the bill. People are angry about the secret deals being cut (see also: Nelson, Ben), the lobbyists running the show and the brazenly broken promises of conducting the debate in the open.

Glenn Greenwald sums up nicely on why Obama is hemorrhaging support for his bill:

A candidate who railed against secret deals and lobbyist influence negotiated this health care plan in secrecy with industry lobbyists, got caught entering into secret deals with the pharmaceutical industry, agreed to abandon his commitment to drug re-importation and bulk price negotiations in order to please the pharmaceutical lobby, and cavalierly refused to abide by his promise to conduct all negotiations out in the open.

Where the health care bill goes from here is anybody's guess, but the Democrats should realize that people across the political spectrum are rightfully unhappy with the bill. If they do not, you can expect an electoral bloodbath in November.

Not even Superman...

I particularly like the sign on the door: "Spending Your Money. Go Away!"

Grade inflation in D.C.

Good government groups have released a report card grading the White House's "lobbying, ethics and transparency" reforms in the past year.

Their findings? Positively glowing:

The new rules and policies have begun the difficult process of changing the way business is done in Washington.

President Obama deserves recognition and high praise for the ethics, lobbying and transparency rules put in place for the Executive Branch during his first year in office.

Our organizations give the Obama Administration very high grades for the Executive Branch reforms it implemented during 2009. (Emphasis mine)

It seems the authors graded the White House based on what it has promised to do, instead of what it has actually done.

That revolving door for lobbyists and former officials? Still open.

Health care negotiations televised on C-SPAN? Campaign gimmick.

Waiting five days before signing legislation? Not even close to happening.

If you want to talk about ethical behavior to Washington, I suggest you start with Timothy Geithner, Tom Daschle, Nancy Killefer or Vivek Kundra.

Not to mention the ghost districts receiving federal stimulus money and FOIA workshops closed to the public.

In short, the White House does not deserve "very high grades" for their reforms this past year.

The White House's record on ethics, lobbying and transparency has been dismal. Anybody who says otherwise is burying their head in the sand.

CCSD drops the transparency ball

Another incisive piece from NPRI's Karen Gray on the Clark County School District's disrespectful attitude towards the public when it comes to transparency:

This attitude — that the public cannot be trusted to correctly evaluate the district's performance — crops up repeatedly within top administrators of the Clark County School District and may well be the district's real problem. CCSD operates a highly restrictive information-control regime that regularly blocks news reporters and researchers from speaking directly to knowledgeable district personnel.

This attitude is far too common in local, state and federal agencies. Bureaucrats convince themselves they know best and the "little people" who ask questions merely get in the way. It never occurs to them that they are our representatives and do our bidding. We must never forget that it is our job to hold them responsible.

They can try to get away with it, but they can be stopped.

Transparency wins in Colorado

Who watches the watchmen?

It turns out that Colorado Ethics Watch does.

Back in April 2009, the Colorado Independent Ethics Commission wrote and deliberated on a nine-page advisory opinion in secret for a state lawmaker. They issued the opinion in a quick, five-minute meeting in clear violation of the state's open meeting laws which states that "all policy discussions [should] take place in public."

Colorado Ethics Watch took the Commission to court, a judge recently ruled that the open meetings law had been violated.

Legislators violating open meeting laws is one thing. The Colorado Independent Ethics Commission violating them, however, is another thing entirely. Their only job is to faithfully understand and apply state ethics laws and sadly, they clearly failed to do so here.

Fortunately, the citizens of Colorado can count on Colorado Ethics Watch to stand guard against such blatant violations of state law.

(Thanks Unequivocal for the tip)

C-SPAN CEO to Congress: Let us in!

The CEO of C-SPAN has written a letter to the leaders of the House and Senate asking them to incorporate C-SPAN coverage into the health care deliberations.

I think you can safely file this one under "don't hold your breath."

Unfortunately, transparency is always supported in principle but is readily discarded when it would be inconvenient for those in charge.

Exhibit A: Obama promising to hold health care negotiations on C-SPAN.

"I'm going to have all the negotiations around a big table. We'll have doctors and nurses and hospital administrators. Insurance companies, drug companies -- they'll get a seat at the table, they just won't be able to buy every chair. But what we will do is, we'll have the negotiations televised on C-SPAN, so that people can see who is making arguments on behalf of their constituents, and who are making arguments on behalf of the drug companies or the insurance companies. And so, that approach, I think is what is going to allow people to stay involved in this process."

- Town hall meeting on Aug. 21, 2008, in Chester, Va.

Instead of following through on that promise, however, the Administration secretly bought off potential opposition to their health care plans by making the very deals candidate Obama denounced.

While Obama rightfully deserves to be dinged for his behind-the-scenes deal making, blame falls on others as well.

Exhibit B: Ben Nelson's "Nebraska Compromise Buy-Off"

Imagine if Harry Reid was forced to gain Ben Nelson's vote live on C-SPAN. No more of this handshake nonsense behind closed doors.

While President Obama has rightly gotten much of the criticism this past year on his transparency record, Congress also needs to feel some heat here.

This discussions involve up to one-sixth of the American economy and, as President Obama promised, they should be held in the public arena.

The White House visitor logs need improvement

With the recent release of 25,000+ visitor logs from the White House, this would be a great time for the Obama Administration to make the logs more complete and useful.

A great place to start would be a new and improved disclosure policy:

The White House will not release fields within the access records that implicate personal privacy or law enforcement concerns (e.g., dates of birth, social security numbers, and contact phone numbers);

Social security and phone numbers are understandable, but why birthdays? Birthdays would go a long way in determining if a given visitor just happens to have a famous name or is a famous person. While it certainly looks like Bill Gates visited the White House twice in 2009, is there anyway to be sure? Including birthdays would not be a panacea, but it would make the visitor log data more useful to the public.

The White House will not release access records related to purely personal guests of the first and second families (i.e., visits that do not involve any official or political business).

Why not include personal guests too? I understand that not everything the President does is in an official capacity, but personal visits should still be noted in these records. Without seeing some kind of record, we won't know what kind of personal visits are taking place. And it would be naive to think the personal and political isn't very intertwined.

To make the White House visitor logs more useful this Administration should include personal visits and include birthdays in the data to see what notable guests the President is meeting with.