Sunshine Review has released a paper about taxpayer-funded lobbying in Illinois, reporting information about lobbying contracts and membership in taxpayer-funded lobbying associations. Taxpayer-funded lobbying associations are groups funded at least in part by public dollars that lobby for the collective interests of government bodies.

The paper reports 31 lobbyists represent the counties, and the counties hold at least 69 memberships to taxpayer-funded lobbying associations. The 10 most populous counties in Illinois alone spent $6.2 million dollars between 2005 and 2010 on lobbying.

Few citizens know tax dollars are spent to hire lobbyists. Without affirmative disclosure laws, citizens and media rarely see any information about taxpayer-funded lobbying and only through Freedom of Information Act requests can someone get this information from the government. More government transparency is surely needed in this area.

For more findings from Sunshine Review, click here.

Does a casino, aquarium, zoo, golf course, or swimming pool sound like recreation or entertainment to you?

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), Ranking Member on the Committee on Government Oversight and Reform, has sent a letter to Earl Devaney, Chairman of the Recovery Act Transparency and Accountability Board, “regarding stimulus funding being steered for projects that appear to violate the explicit prohibitions of the Recovery Act.”

Part of Issa’s letter reads:

“Despite the clear language of the Recovery Act and the subsequent effort by the White House to stress the importance of avoiding the use of stimulus funds for prohibited projects, taxpayer dollars were directed to entities legally barred from receiving them. In fact, stimulus money appears to have flowed to each and every type of project prohibited by Section 1604 of the AARA.”

· Casino: In February 2009, AARA funds were provided to students “at Fortune Bay Resort & Casino to get hands on experience in various departments within the resort and casino at our Career Expo Day.”

· Aquarium: In July 2009, AARA funds were awarded to Northwestern University for scientific research on fish. Part of the funding was used for “novel outreach projects (that) will expose the broader public to the results of research, including an art installation concerning the electric fields emitted by these fish and proposed enhancements to the electric fish displays of the Shedd Aquarium.”

· Zoo: In September of 2009, $25 million in ARRA funds were awarded to the Smithsonian for projects including the “completion of various projects at the National Zoo.”

· Golf Course: AARA funds were awarded to the Forest Hills Golf Course through a U.S. Department of Education grant to the Oregon Department of Education. The award funds a program that allows students in Oregon’s Forest Grove school district to use Forest Hills to learn to golf as part of the physical education curriculum.

· Swimming Pool: In July 2009, AARA funds were awarded to Northwestern University to provide “salary an wage compensation for individuals directly involved in AARA-funded projects” including “Pool Lifeguard.”

Issa also notes “impudent projects” such as spending stimulus money on a “waterpark, a bowling alley, a keg, beer and cigarette mart, a pet hotel, and a fraternity and sorority event.”

This is putting America to work?

Read more here.

In case you missed it, LA Times reporters Jason Felch, Jason Song and Doug Smith used California’s public records law to obtain seven years of math and English test scores from the Los Angeles Unified School District. They asked Richard Buddin, a well-respected analyst at the RAND Corporation, to run the numbers and estimate teacher effectiveness — just as many states around the country are considering, and in a few cases starting to do.

The story was an eye-opener. The Times didn’t just present the results; it named names. Much of this sort of data never sees the light of day. What’s more, according to the story: “The district has had the ability to analyze the differences among teachers for years but opted not to do so, in large part because of anticipated union resistance.”

The story has created an interesting response, from teachers, unions, education scholars and more. See here for some reactions and the full story, including remarks from Jay P. Greene, 21st Century Chair in Education Reform at the University of Arkansas:

“It’s no longer possible to hide the fact that there are some awful teachers who continue receiving paychecks and depriving kids of an education,” he wrote. “School officials have had these data for years and never used them, never tried to identify who were the best and worst teachers, and never tried to remove bad teachers from the profession. It took a newspaper and a big [freedom of information] request.”

Transparency is a great tool for measuring what government programs, or in this case, which teachers, are performing well or poorly. Increased transparency can mean increased government accountability, but only if government receives continued pressure from the public and media and fully utilizes this tool.

For the full story on the LA Times piece, click here.

The Institute argued against this bill, saying it would threaten transparency in government by prohibiting the release of public employee performance reviews under FOIA. The idea started with some lawmakers wanting to exempt teachers’ performance evaluations, and then it expanded to all public employees.

Fortunately, the State Journal Register reports, “Quinn’s change to House Bill 5154 would exempt only state and local law enforcement personnel from the requirement that performance evaluations be public information.”

This is definitely an improvement:

Quinn wrote in his veto message, “House Bill 5154 exempts all public employees’ performance evaluations from disclosure under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). This exemption is a departure from groundbreaking legislation that I approved just last year, making our State’s open information laws among the most robust in the entire country.”

However, Quinn thinks public safety officials should have their evaluations kept from public view: “If disclosed, these evaluations could be used by criminal suspects or defendants to undermine a police investigation or attack the credibility and integrity of a police officer,” Quinn wrote.

Quinn has made a positive move regarding this bill. If it had received his signature as is, its passage would have been a major step backwards in the movement for more transparency and accountability in government.

Now, Texans can “search for information that matters to them, perform online transactions with 24/7 assistance, use an intuitive and effective search function, and access discussion forums designed to increase engagement between citizens and state government,” according to the Wall Street Journal’s MarketWatch.

The website (http://www.texas.gov) delivers over 1,000 services and offers a single, comprehensive online resource, making government “available to Texans anytime, anywhere.” In addition, the website comes at no additional cost to taxpayers! It’s entirely self-funded, and has “processed over 118 million financial transactions and collected over $13 billion on behalf of participating entities.”

For more, check out this link. Illinois would do well to take a look at what Texas is doing and learn from a state improving services to its citizens by advancing open government and pushing to improve the ways in which it delivers services at no cost to taxpayers.

HB2235 passed in August last year, giving all school districts in Illinois until July 1, 2010 to “report the base salary and benefits of the school superintendent, all administrators and teachers by July 1, starting in 2010. The information, including vacation and sick days, bonuses and retirement enhancements, will be sent to the State Board of Education.” This law includes public universities and community colleges.

Another bill also passed in August, SB2270, which requires school districts to post online administrator’s base salary, bonuses, pension contributions, the cost of health insurance and any other form of compensation.

Since school districts will be required to gather and report salary information for all administrators and teachers to the State Board of Education, it should be very simple for school districts to go ahead and post this information on their own websites. Plus, SB2270 already requires administrators’ information to be posted online, so why not go ahead and post both administrators’ and teachers’ information?

It seems like a logical step, and a step towards more open, accountable government.

The Open Meetings Minutes Act, sponsored by Rep. Renée Kosel and Sen. Susan Garrett, would improve the current Open Meetings Act by requiring more timely disclosure of meeting minutes. For more on this legislation, click here.

The Sunshine Commission Act, sponsored by Rep. David Reis and Sen. Matt Murphy, would create a Sunshine Commission to review the relevance, efficiency and effectiveness of state programs. For more on this legislation, click here.

Both of these bills are much-needed good government reforms that would bring about more government accountability and transparency to Illinois.

The report also reveals Chicago’s sweeping disregard for the Freedom of Information Act:

The problem, it seems, is that public officials in Chicago act like it’s their money – and their government. Aside from relying on your money to fund them, you are incidental at best and a treacherous obstacle at worst.

The Beachwood provides a slew of examples highlighting the City of Chicago’s poor response, which you can find here.

Sound familiar?

The site is getting mixed reviews from some media and members of the public, reacting to one addition, which involves listing information about the actual person filing Freedom of Information requests to the city. Although not required by law to do so, the city will list the name, requesting organization, and the documents requested through the FOIA.

Posting FOIA requests and the city’s responses to those requests would be helpful information to have online. However, some are questioning, “Why can’t they post the FOIA request without names and affiliations?”

For a look at the site, click here.

• Offer government administrators a valuable tool to help drive cost savings and better health care outcomes;
• Allow taxpayers greater insight into how their dollars are spent by state government;
• Fulfill a recommendation of the Taxpayer Action Board; and
• Promote an open and transparent state government.

If implemented, Medicaid Transparency would inject much-needed sunshine into how Medicaid is managed and help establish more government accountability and public understanding about the program.

For updates on the the status of Medicaid Transparency, follow this link.

For more information on HB5241, check out the Institute’s testimony (http://www.illinoispolicy.org/news/article.asp?ArticleSource=2227) in front of the Illinois House of Representatives Medicaid Reform, Family & Children Services Committee.