Sunlight Foundation Asks The Public For Ideas On A More Accountable Government

Publication: Wired

March 31, 2008

As has been documented repeatedly, President Bush has run one of the most secretive administrations in recent memory. For their part, members of congress haven't fared so well in public opinion polls either when it comes to openness and accountability. So perhaps it's not surprising that government transparency and accountability have become themes in this year's presidential campaign.

Democratic presidential contenders Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have both offered plans to improve government transparency, with Obama's campaign stressing the role that technology could play in facilitating the process.

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain supports at least one idea along with senator Joe Lieberman that would make congressional research reports more widely available to the public over the internet. That idea is currently stalled in Congress. 

A new effort put together by the Sunlight Foundation, a Washington DC non-profit,  has pulled together various ideas that have been floating around Congress for some time, consolidates them and asks the public for feedback.

Sunlight has created an online 'bill' called the Transparency in Government Act 2008. It has nine sections and addresses transparency both in Congress and the executive branch. The foundation has used a blog-like format, which allows the public to submit their own ideas and commentary on the proposed legislation.

The foundation has dubbed the project Public Markup since that's the term used by inside-the-beltway types for the process of people from both sides of the aisle working together to shape legislation.

A lot of information about the federal government -- lobbyist filings and meetings, the awarding of federal contracts, congressional travel reports and such, is already available. The problem is much of that information is either not very detailed, is in a format that's not easy to search and make sense of, or is filed months after events happened.

The project's overarching goal is to make the whole process of government more transparent and accountable by making information about congressional lawmakers, as well as the federal government, available in a more timely manner.

The Sunlight Foundation wants public feedback on its effort.

"As this is our first stab at creating such comprehensive transparency legislation, we want others to tell us if we aren't being aggressive enough, or are too aggressive in our initial approach to these issues," writes the Sunlight Foundation's co-founder Ellen Miller. "For example, should we have included a requirement mandating daily filing (not monthly) for lobbyists? Part our team thinks that if lobbyists aren't required to file daily, then citizens will often know after the fact about who was being lobbied about what."

John Wonderlich, the Sunlight Foundation's program director, says that his organization has formed working relationships with both House majority and minority leaders, who he says have been receptive to Sunlight's ideas.

One idea from Sunlight that all journalists are sure to welcome: Limiting the time government agencies can delay fulfilling Freedom of Information Act requests. Sunlight suggests implementing a rule that would force government agencies to fulfill such requests within 60 days of the requests' original due dates.