• The Salt Lake Tribune covered a  University of Utah honors class project: developing a set of five guiding principles to help local governments throughout the state increase transparency. The project’s goal is to persuade all 270-plus county and city governments in Utah to adopt their  principles to make their government more open. The projects focused on transparency in the age of the Internet. Moreover, the class itself operated in a transparent manner: “Every lecture was videotaped; every class presentation, too. Students had to comment daily on Facebook pages, Twitter accounts and blogs. Anyone who wanted could see what the Think Tank and its individual members were up to — and some students developed notable followings.” Theresa Krause, one of the participating students, maintained  "Information is the currency of democracy. It is the key to citizen engagement.  "The Internet has made data available and changed the way we think about transparency and access to government." For the whole story, check out Mike Gorell’s post on the Salt Lake Tribune.
• The week, the Maine House rejected a bill that would have exempted the governor’s working papers from the state’s Freedom of Access laws.  The bill would have also exempted some members of the governor's staff from Freedom of Access Act, at least until the end of the legislative session. They include the governor's chief of staff, legal counsel, director of policy and employees under their direct supervision. Representative Kim Monaghan-Derrig told her colleagues that she worried the bill would  hurt the state’s transparency. For more information, see Susan Sharon’s post on the Maine Public Broadcasting Network. 
• In order to avoid a violation of the Massachusetts Open Meetings Law, Scituate selectmen met for a special meeting to reaffirm a vote they took to approve contracts with non-union employees. In an executive session last November, the board voted to approve the contracts, including the contract for the Town Administrator, which is a violation of the open meeting law. They reaffirmed the vote in an open session this week. Selectmen Chair Tony Vegnani addressed the issue and said, “We met this evening to address a ruling from the Town of Carver, in regards to the Open Meeting Law. In November, we accepted three non-union contracts; the Town Accountant, Town Treasurer and Town Administrator and we did it in executive session. A month later in December, a ruling of the Open Meeting Law said that contracts needed to be accepted in open session. We read it in Beacon and talked to town counsel about it and they thought it would prudent, if we actually accepted the contracts in open meeting, as opposed to executive session.” For the whole story, see John Penny’s post on 959 WATD. 
• The McPherson School building is an old Illinois building  with an incredibly rich history. The building will be on the receiving end of a million dollar infrastructure improvement project. The funds will be dispersed by the Illinois Local School Council (LSC).  According to Patrick Boylan, “Our biggest complaint about McPherson is there is a corporate culture apparent that wants secrecy.” He maintains, “The price for those public dollars should be greater transparency at McPherson. Alone, of the LSCs examined by The Bulldog, McPherson has no records available to the public. It puts hurdles up to public access and it may be responsible, in part, for the decision by CPS to restrict public access to LSC election information. That culture of mistrust must change.” He calls on the Local School Council to make their process more transparent by disclosing meeting minutes and agendas online and making meetings more inclusive to the public. For his take, check out his post on the Wells Park Bulldog. 

Last week, due to Veterans Day we were unable to publish the weekly roundup. Here is what you missed in last week's roundup of transparency blogs around the nation. This week's roundup will be coming up shortly.

• According to The Sunshine Review, 254 Texas county websites earned F grades for transparency and accessibility. These districts receive sales or property tax dollars, yet claim that their salary data is not subject to the Texas Open Information Act. Curt Olsen find their lack of transparency unacceptable, arguing, “No public official should ignore that they’re being watched by groups like Sunshine Review to ensure taxpayers at their desktop or laptop computer can see specific information about the budget, meetings, public officials, and ethics.” He goes on to say, “Transparency and accountability is still about actions, not words, and it’s about time the people running these special districts understood taxpayers are their CEO.” For the rest of his take, check out his post on Texas Budget Source.

• The Austin Independent School District agreed to release a report that deals with the closing, repurposing, and consolidation of nine schools in Central Texas. The district was supposed to release the report to The Austin American Stateman several days prior to a school board meeting scheduled for Monday. However,   district officials later said they would only release the document if the newspaper’s editors and reporters were willing to wait until 10 PM Monday night, several hours after the meeting would have taken place. The school district claims that the report was actually a “working draft,” which exempts it from the state’s open records law. Curt Olsen remains unconvinced, maintaining, “transparency with conditions is not transparency." Read more of his take at the Texas Budget Source.

• The Attorney General of Massachusetts has just released a new website to ensure all meetings are in accordance with the Open Meetings Law. Members of the public, press, municipal officials, and public bodies may access its determinations by searching for key terms or phrases or by actions ordered. According to Jefferey Roy, “The Open Meeting Law supports the principle that the democratic process depends on the public having knowledge about the considerations underlying governmental action. It requires that most meetings of governmental bodies to be held in public.” Find out more at the Franklin School Committee Blog.

• According to Max Brantley, Little Rock’s city hall is violating transparency laws. Two days after Brantly filed an FOI for accumulated city data on ward redistricting, none have been provided. The custodian of the documents has not replied, as law requires, to his FOI request. City manager Bruce Moore claims they have published the only document pertaining to redistricting, however,  Brantly disagrees. He asks readers, “Do you trust them to be any more forthcoming about decisions on spending their new half-billion dollars?” Read more at the Arkansas Blog.

• Former city council candidate and California attorney Mauren Sundstrom  filed a complaint with the San Bernardino County District Attorney alleging that Upland City Council committed two open meeting law violations. She alleges that these meetings violated the Brown Act, which allows the public the opportunity participate in meetings of local government agencies. Sundstrom maintains that she wants city council to realize they may not be as open as they think they are. Read Sandra Emerson’s  post on Inland Politics to find out more.

Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick is set to name former Democratic National Committee Chairman Paul Kirk, 71, the interim senator to replace the late Sen. Ted Kennedy. Kirk, a close Kennedy confidante, was the choice of the late Sen. Kennedy's close family.

Kirk would come into office at an important moment as the Senate prepares to vote on vast legislation to reform health care and regulate the financial sector. Kirk's current and previous employment may not make him look like the best choice for this moment. Kirk is the CEO and Chairman of Kirk & Associates, a business consulting company, and sits on the board of both an insurance company, The Hartford Financial Group, and a timber and real estate company, Rayonier, Inc. Kirk also previously worked as a lobbyist for a pharmaceutical company, Aventis.

The Hartford Financial Group (known as The Hartford) stands out particularly among all of the Kirk's connections as the firm's clout fell dramatically after the September 2008 financial collapse. In November 2008, the firm received $3.4 billion in TARP aid from the Treasury Department. The firm has been downgraded by analysts multiple times this year.

Kirk sits on the Compensation and Personnel Committee for The Hartford in charge of employee compensation and executive bonuses. While compensation fell significantly from 2007 to 2008, this did not keep The Hartford from escaping criticism for compensation policies. Ramani Ayer, CEO and Chairman of The Hartford, was named by Forbes Magazine one of the most overpaid executives in 2008. This despite his compensation being reduced from $15.8 in 2007 to $9 million in 2008. Ayer's stewardship of the firm sat at the center of his placement on Forbes' list. According to Forbes, Ayer's six year average compensation stands at $13.5 million while the annualized six year total return was -17%.

In 1999, Kirk represented the pharmaceutical company Aventis as a lobbyist for Sullivan & Worcester. Kirk listed on his lobbying disclosure forms "FDA reform" as the sole issue and the Senate as the only body he was lobbying. In 1997, Congress passed and the President signed into law the FDA Modernization Act. One provision of the bill sought to curb red-tape and regulation to streamline the drug approval process. After the bill's passage pharmaceutical companies and their lobbying arm, PhRMA, complained about the FDA's speed at implementing the legislation and continued existence of some regulatory barriers. In 1999, the Senate held hearings on the subject with PhRMA President Alan Holmer told the Senate Health, Education, Pensions and Labor Committee that the legislation "fails to provide the regulatory relief Congress intended and actually codifies some of the agency's prior-approval practices that Congress wanted to eliminate." Kirk's focus on "FDA reform" for Aventis was likely related to the complaints about the FDA Modernization Act and its implementation.

Rayonier, one of the largest holders of land in the country, is currently lobbying the United States Senate on the definition of biomass in the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES). The Senate is likely to take up ACES soon after it completes work on health care reform legislation.

Kirk previously worked as a special assistant to the late Sen. Kennedy from 1969 to 1977 and is the chairman of the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation.

Boston's Web Portal has been receiving more traffic and it is mainly due to the site managers allowing city employees to contribute personally to the site.  Using software that allows every employee the ability to update the Web site and add content as they see fit allows the site to become more interesting and diverse.

Instead of relying on IT staff to update the site city employees can update information that they see relevant to citizens of the city.  This is a great example of why employees should be given more control over content on government websites.  They are the ones that know what people are looking for and  are knowledgable about what is happening in the city.  This makes the site more valuable to citizens.  I hope more cities allow their employees to create content on city portals.  I also hope they expand this and maybe even create a wiki so citizens can add their knowledge to the pot.

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. I have highlights from Kansas, Washington, and Massachusetts.

Kansas MeadowLark has an excellent post on the different reporting requirements Kansas has for out of state PACs versus in state PACs.  The post points out that a large sum of money from out of state PACs are not being put online so people can find them.

In Washington, HorsesAss, has a great post on possible campaign donation disclosure violations by the State Attorney General and the Washington Association of Realtors.

In Massachusetts, Hub Politics, talks about Gov. Patrick’s Task Force on Public Integrity’s meeting.  The meeting is set to ask citizens for input on how to keep lawmakers more honest.

Several states are starting to get pressured to strengthen ethics laws after several incidents of corruption.  Major ethics changes are being pursued in New York, Massachusetts, Utah, and New Jersey.

In New York, reform groups want more disclosure regarding state lawmakers personal finances.  Right now lawmakers are part time and are allowed to have outside jobs.  While it is required that they report the source of the outside income, the actual income is presented in ranges not specifics.  Critics say that by not allowing for more scrutiny of where lawmakers are getting their money it can never be determined if they are truly working for the citizens that elect them.  Lawmakers say that more disclosure of personal finances would intrude privacy and could deter people from running for office.

In New Jersey, Gov. Corzine has introduced an ethics reform package, which focus on campaign contributions and local ethics laws.  The package includes measures that will be passed through executive order.  In response a State Sens. Kean, Oroho and Batemen have introduced legislation that they say will fill the loopholes by requiring contribution limits by individuals, as well as, PACs.

Massachusetts has been rocked by a major bribery case involving State Senator Dianne Wilkerson (Who I happened to have interned with when I was in college.)  There is a lot of debate going on as to what the next step to tighten ethics issues in the state legislature should be.  The state's lobbying laws conflict with each other about the amount a lobbyist can gift to a legislator.  The Secretary of State has no subpeona power to enforce regulations and reporting requiremesnt are narrow.  These loopholes let lobbyists make a lot of money in Massachuestts so the state has a lot of clean up to do.

In Utah, the state legislature is considering broad ethics reforms after several allegations of bribery.  State legislators are trying to get campaign donations to be more transparent, prevent lawmakers from using campaign funds for personal purposes and possibly creating an independent commission to deal with ethics violations.

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?

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 Arizona, Massachusetts, Mississippi, and Nevada.

In Arizona, AZCentral reports on how for the first time ever citizens will get to choose whether their state representatives get a pay raise or not.

In Massachusetts, Hub Politics reports about state senate republicans’ new blog.

In Mississippi, Alaskan Jambalaya has a post about Hank Paulson lobbying efforts before he became Secretary of the Treasury.

In Nevada, Vote Gibbons Out is asking people to dig into the state level campaign finance reports. Apparently they are difficult to decipher them when they are hand written. I wonder if the FEC has that problem with Senate campaign finance reports since the Senate is not required to file electronically. Indecipherable election information should become a thing of the past. www.Pass223.com