Last week, the Delaware legislature sent an interesting bill to Governor Jack Merkell: SB 185, a short, targeted piece of legislation that, if signed into law, will bring Delaware’s lobbying disclosure into the 21st century.

With the passage of SB 185, online disclosure will be the default for all lobbying reports and lobbyist registration. (Paper filing will only be acceptable in the (hopefully) rare event that the electronic filing system is offline.) Further, SB 185 requires that lobbyists “disclose the bill, resolution, or regulation on which they are lobbying...within five business days of contact with a relevant public official” -- which, while not real time reporting, is pretty darn close and puts SB 185 on par with the disclosure deadlines proposed in a federal bill Sunlight supports: the Lobbying Disclosure Enhancement Act, introduced last June.

Of course, these electronic requirements would mean nothing if they remained out of the public’s reach. That’s why one of SB 185’s most important proposals is to charge the Public Integrity Commission -- the agency that administers many of Delaware's ethics and disclosure laws and receives these filings -- with making these reports available online “in a manner in which they can be easily reviewed by bill, resolution, regulation, lobbyist or employer, and that regular updates be distributed to members of the General Assembly.”

These are solid -- but not sweeping -- reforms. Although it’s critical that Delaware -- and all state governments -- require electronic filing and public-facing databases of influence data (updated in real time), when it comes to the transparency of lobbying records and practices, Delaware still has a ways to go. Earlier this year, the state received an “F” in Lobbying Disclosure from the State Integrity Investigation, which issued report cards to all 50 states, grading them based on a quantitative analysis of anti-corruption and pro-accountability laws and measures. Delaware’s “F” earned it the rank of fourth worst in the nation on lobbying disclosure and dragged down its overall score to a C-. Although lawmakers cited the bill (and Governor Markell endorsed it) as part of their effort to improve the state’s score, SB 185 really only improves on the part of lobbying disclosure that Delaware was already doing well: general public access to disclosed information. Prior to SB 185, Delaware was publishing its lobbying reports online for free, but it was not making these documents available in a searchable database (nor was it releasing this info in as timely a manner as possible). SB 185 will change that.

What the bill won’t vastly change is what information lobbyists need to disclose. SB 185 could be strengthened by requiring that the names of the specific officials or lawmakers lobbied are disclosed or if it created provisions for enforcement mechanisms, such as independent audits of disclosure records.¹ But just because 185 could be better doesn't mean that it isn’t worth the Governor’s signature: Policy, like technology, is iterative, and what SB 185 does to demonstrate Delaware’s willingness to use technology to support greater public monitoring can’t be underrated. Plus, SB 185 does require some new information be released: If made law, lobbyists will newly have to identify the specific bill, resolution or regulation they’re working on, a valuable addition to the lobbying information currently available to Delawareans.

SB 185 is an excellent example of a small but important step that all state legislatures should make to solidify public access to influence data, and it provides a great platform for Delaware to build on in its efforts to improve the quality and depth of its transparency laws. Let’s hope they do.

Full bill text available here.

¹ More info on Sunlight’s Lobbying Reform platform.

• Delaware Governor Jack Markell signed an executive order today intended to simplify the process for citizens looking to access government documents through the Freedom of Information Act. The state has been criticized in the past for “complex” and “inconsistent” policies related to requesting government documents in FOIA requests. According to blogger Jennifer Hayes, “The executive order will require all executive branch agencies to adopt a standard policy  for requests in order to streamline the process and make it less costly to the requester.” Markell hopes this will increase the government’s transparency and openness. He maintains, “We knew we had to do better,” Markell said. “Access is vital to the healthy functioning of a democracy.” For Hayes' take, read her post on SussexCountian. 

• Minnesota's Farmington School Board members are changing the way they respond electronically to constituents to avoid potentially violating open meeting laws. Transparency concerns occurred after email conversations with constituents were sent by “reply all” to other board members. This could put board members in violation of open meeting laws. Although email isn’t specifically addressed in the law, issues occur regarding proper responses. School Board Chair Tera Lee said emails could be misinterpreted by other board members as an attempt to sway a vote even if that’s not the way it was intended by the writer."That’s the problem with email too, is that it’s such a grey area,” she said. For the entire story, read Laura Adelmann's post on This Week Live. 

Every week I climb into the depths of the local political blogosphere to find the Sunlight. I use this series to highlight local blogs that do a great job of covering local, state, and congressional political news.  This week I have highlights from Virginia, Maryland, Delaware

In Virgina, Shaun Kenney writes about Virginia part time legislature and the conflict of interest that grows from it.  Virginia has a part time legislature which creates a lot of examples of conflict of interest, for instance, "Delegate Jennifer McClellan continues to hold her seat despite her professional employment as a lobbyist for Verizon."  This post was in response to Waldo Jaquith's post about  a Virginia legislator who basically wrote himself an earmark- "Hamilton had Old Dominion University hire him as a consultant, using funding he’d allocate from the state budget."  Jaquith suggests that Virginia should make their state legislature full time and pay their lawmakers more.  Shaun counters that more time and money won't make lawmakers more ethical, so he suggests a shorter legislative session with no pay.  For the several state legislatures that are part time (Montana's meets once every 2 years for example) this is an important discussion.  The question of  what kind of lawmaker you want to represent you is one of the defining debates of any republic. 

In Maryland, Annapolis Politics has a post about analyzing campaign finance reports.  "You don't really need intelligence--what you really need is time.and a cynical attitude."  It's an excellent summary of what to look at:  Key notes of information: amount of donation, type of donor, location of donor, amount of money raised, and ending cash on hand.

Kilroys Delaware has a post about school district transparency new legislation would require school districts to post, on their Web site, a check register of every check they write and update the register every three months.  This is a great first step for school district budget transparency.  Even though three months is pretty decent disclosure time schedule, they should really aim for real time disclosure, since checks are all done electronically real time shouldn't be a technical problem.

This week I have highlights from California, Hawaii, Delaware, Idaho, New York, Pennsylvania, and New Mexico.

California Progress Report has a post about two new bills that would increase public access to campaign finance reports and lobbying records.  They are being introduced by freshmen Assemblymember Alyson Huber, " AB 1181 would require all state candidate committees, ballot measure committees and slate mail organizations to file contributors online with the Secretary of State’s office."  Apparently there is already a free online form for filing campaign donations but they are not required to file that way so they don't.  Hmmm sounds familiar.  The other bill "AB 1274 would require the California Secretary of State to link reported lobbying activities to specific legislation."  I hope these bills pass because they would make California more transparent and the elected officials there more accountable. In Hawaii, ILind.net has a post about lobbying disclosure. The State of Hawaii requires lobbyist to file expenditure report every two months and January and February were due this week.  ILind observes that McDonalds Corporation, despite having an annual legislative reception, did not disclose the costs associated with it.  He goes on to discuss that this could be an ommission on McDonalds side or that the requirements for disclosing need to become more stringent.  Either way Hawaii needs to consider stronger enforcement procedures for lobbying disclosure. Delaware Watch blogs about his experience meeting with Gov. Jack Markell, who went to meet bloggers at a local Panera Café. I think it is fantastic that Gov. Markell takes time to meet with bloggers and answer questions in an informal way.  I hope this is a consistent event in all parts of the state. Idaho’s Eye on Boise reports about the unanimous vote by the state senate to expand sunshine law and add the personal financial disclosure requirements.  This bill is now onto the house, hopefully it will pass with as much support. New York’s Fighting 29th has a post about Rep. Eric Massa’s decision to fight Time-Warner Cable’s broadband cap. This despite Time-Warner being a major donor.  I like this post because it is a good example of why making campaign donations available in a timely manner can build trust with elected officials.  Rep. Massa's decision to not support Time Warner's policy even though they are a major donor means that his constituents don't see a conflict of interest and can trust him. Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Foundation has a post about PA house republican leader Sam Smith’s 12 point government reform plan.  It is a decent list of reforms that should be done to make sure elected officials are being transparent and accountable.  I look forward to see how these reforms go through the legislature. New Mexico’s Independent reports that they will soon have an online, searchable database of state government contracts, but only ones worth more than $20,000.

Every week I climb into the depths of the local political blogosphere to find the Sunlight. I use this series to highlight local blogs that do a great job of covering local, state, and congressional political news. This week I have highlights from South Dakota, Texas, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Delaware, and Washington. South Dakota Watch has a great post on the state of media in South Dakota.  The great part of this post is that he no longer wants to sit back and watch the main stream media fail the residents of South Dakota.  The posted letter he sent to bloggers, asks the citizen journalists of South Dakota to seriously consider joining forces in order to cover the news that is important to people who count on it.

In Texas, Matt Glazer at Burnt Orange highlights a news story about the cost of improvements to the private Texas House Members Lounge. The furnishings totaled $140,000 for a room that the public has no access to but are fitting the bill for.

In Massachuesetts, the Red Mass Group highlights the proposal from the State House to beef up ethics reform this includes lobbying disclosure and having redistricting done by an independent body.

In New Mexico, Mario Burgos points to an earmark in the Bailout Bill for people who bike to work.  He wonders why this was included in bailout legislation aimed at Wall Street.

Delaware Liberal has a great post about starting a conversation with state elected officials about open government. They then proceed to list state senators and their home phone numbers. Good Luck!

In Washington, OlyBlog points to a City Counselor’s Facebook page. The Counselor apparently updated his status one day as “Jeff is listening to an Idiot at the moment.”  When asked to expound on the status he said he was a City Counselor and was at a hearing and a citizen he was listening to at that moment was an idiot.   Is this good transparency or bad transparency?