TransparentNevada's Blog

That famous D.C. stench

2010-03-10T15:46:00.000-08:00

Great editorial today in Roll Call on the recently concluded ethics investigation into improper ties between the lobbying firm PMA Group and seven House members who were cleared of any wrongdoing.

In clearing all seven, the committee asserted it had reviewed nearly 250,000 pages of documents and conducted interviews with "numerous witnesses." But Roll Call contacted numerous firms and Member offices that would have been logical sources of information for the committee — and found that not a single one had been contacted or asked for documents.

This is like writing a book report without reading the book or voting on legislation without having read it. No one can do a good job in those circumstances.

The House should examine what actions — if any — the ethics committee took in preparing the report that cleared the seven House lawmakers. If it issued this report without interviewing the key parties, the public must call its ability to police the House of Representatives into question.

Rep. Frank invites C-SPAN to Capitol Hill

2010-03-10T15:45:00.000-08:00

Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) wants C-SPAN to broadcast the House and Senate conference meeting on proposed finance reform bills.

The type of "old-fashioned" conference Frank is talking about is a real rarity in today’s Congress. House and Senate negotiators would debate the points of disagreement between the two chambers, voting point-by-point in open session – an open session that Frank would like broadcast on C-SPAN for all the world to see.

While his primarily motivations are undoubtedly political — he wants TV cameras to catch Republicans opposing the expansion of politically popular financial regulation — this is still a good idea and one that should be used on other bills as well.

Neither the stimulus bill nor the health care bill had anywhere near this kind of transparency in their deal making stages. The health care bill especially — with its noxious inclusion of the "Cornhusker Kickback" and "Louisiana Purchase" provisions — would have benefited greatly from a more open process.

Seeking the Governor's emails

2010-03-03T12:44:00.000-08:00

I wonder if he's trying to hide anything:

Gov. Jim Gibbons believes that traffic through his state-issued e-mail account is not public.

And he maintains that he should not be required to reveal a list of the names, dates and a brief subject of these e-mail messages.

But the Reno Newspapers says this traffic on the state-issue e-mail account is subject to the Nevada’s Open Records law.

The Nevada Supreme Court hears arguments Monday whether to overturn the decision of District Judge Todd Russell who sided with the governor.

Let's hope the Court acknowledges the importance open records laws and grants the public access to the Governor's state-issued e-mail account.

Rangel steps down for now

2010-03-03T10:48:00.000-08:00

How the mighty have fallen:

New York Democrat Rep. Charlie Rangel stepped down from his post atop the powerful tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee today pending the completion of several ethics investigations into his conduct.

The pending ethics investigations include his role in obtaining four rent-controlled apartments in New York City, using his office to raise money for the Rangel Center for Public Service at City College of New York and a failure to disclose rental income from a Dominican Republic apartment. All these follow his admonishment last week for accepting corporate-funded trips to the Caribbean.

He has only agreed to step down temporarily, until the pending investigations are complete. He no doubt assumes he will be vindicated and hopes to re-gain his position as Chair eventually.

While he should have stepped down months ago, this is a step in the right direction. Being in charge of the tax-writing committee is a huge responsibility with enormous power and the People need to trust that the chairman is both honest and ethical. With these investigations, that trust has been damaged if not entirely lost.

Rangel admonished by ethics panel

2010-03-01T12:15:00.000-08:00

Looks like the most honest, ethical and open Congress in history has taken another hit:

The House ethics committee said on Thursday that it had admonished Representative Charles B. Rangel for violating Congressional gift rules by accepting corporate-sponsored trips to the Caribbean in 2007 and 2008.

Right on cue, Pelosi stepped up to defend her ethically challenged colleague:

Ms. Pelosi did say she had not read the findings of the House ethics committee, which determined that he violated Congressional gift rules by accepting corporate-sponsored trips in 2007 and 2008. But she parsed the ruling a bit differently than the panel itself, saying it didn’t find that he had knowledge of the sponsorships himself. “And I think that’s an important statement they made,” she said.

They both claim that because he wasn't personally aware of the nature of the trips, he shouldn't be held responsible. This, of course, is nonsense. Two members of his staff were aware and he is the one ultimately in charge.

Even liberals such as Markos Moulitsas have called for him to be stripped of his chairmanship of the Ways and Means Committee. Unfortunately this will never happen because Rangel is politically untouchable:

In Rangel’s case, the particular issue has to do with the Congressional Black Caucus, of which he is a founding member. For understandable reasons, the CBC tends to be sensitive when it comes to gavels and committee assignments. Historically, many of its members – like Rangel – have relied on the seniority system for their political status and power. The idea of removing a CBC member from a choice assignment or bypassing a CBC member for a plum opening is not to be considered lightly.

Pelosi would be wise to re-consider her support of Rangel. Pelosi ran hard against Republican corruption and was rewarded with control of the House in 2006. If she doesn't remove this albatross soon, expect Republicans to run similarly hard on the issue and potentially achieve the same outcome.

You can read the report here.

Boehner promises a more transparent House

2010-02-25T15:34:00.000-08:00

House Republican leader John Boehner has promised to run things more transparently if Republicans take the House in November:

Mr. Boehner’s promises focus mainly on transparency, a new cause of House Republicans. He said he would require that bills be posted online for at least three days before any votes, Rules Committee meetings would be televised, lawmakers would be prohibited from seeking money to build projects named for themselves and pet projects could not be added to bills at the last minute.

Transparency promises are as non-controversial as American flags and apple pie, but I'm glad he went on record supporting some concrete proposals. Should he become Speaker, let's hope he'll follow through.

What the stimulus bill has done for Nevada

2010-02-17T15:51:00.000-08:00

It was one year ago today that the stimulus bill was signed into law.

Those interested in what Nevada has done with the money should check out its entry on Recovery.gov. Here are some of the more interesting items.

Nevada has received 736 awards, most of them in the form of grants. The state has been awarded $1,389,862,617 and has received $413,752,785.

The Clark County School District has been the largest recipient of the funds, followed by NV Energy and the Nevada Department of Transportation.

The Departments of Education, Energy and Transportation have provided most of the funding to Nevada.

A total of 3,149 jobs have been either "created or saved" from October 1st to December 31st of last year.

Demand Question Time

2010-02-11T15:22:00.000-08:00

By now I'm sure you've heard about President Obama's meeting with House Republicans in Baltimore a few weeks ago. The meeting was one of the most interesting in recent political memory, a refreshing change of pace from the "Washington as usual" game of sound bites and grandstanding.

In the wake of the meeting, a group of "activists, writers, bloggers, journalists, technologists, philanthropists and politicos" got together with a simple petition:

America could use more of this — an unfettered and public airing of political differences by our elected representatives. So we call on President Barack Obama and House Minority Leader John Boehner to hold these sessions regularly — and allow them to be broadcast and webcast live and without commercial interruption, sponsorship or intermediaries. We also urge the President and the Republican Senate caucus to follow suit. And we ask the President and the House and Senate caucuses of his own party to consider mounting similar direct question-and-answer sessions. We will ask future Presidents and Congresses to do the same.

Demand Question Time is based on the idea that our political discourse is bettered by the free and open debate of ideas. If you agree, you may want to consider signing their pledge.

Gathering over 15,000 signatures, it has gained wide bipartisan support. Both Grover Norquist and the president of MoveOn.org have signed on, along with countless others.

Here is the video from the event. The Q&A portion begins about 19 minutes in.

Transparency promises: easy to make, easy to break

2010-02-01T15:57:00.000-08:00

Transparency might be the only political position that every politician supports. From the far-left to the far-right and everybody in between, all politicians seem to agree on the necessity of keeping government open, honest and accountable.

Why, then, is this commitment so hard to follow through on?

President Barack Obama, state legislators, Gov. Jim Gibbons and his campaign opponents — Democrats and Republicans — all have promised to swing wide the shutters so the public can see how their tax dollars are haggled over and the future of the state and nation are shaped.

Then reality, or maybe just expediency, hits and the promises seldom translate into something the public can see.

I think the reason for this is that politicians simply don't see transparency as important to the political process. They feel that as long as the sausage gets made, how it was prepared matters little.

Well, it does matter. Involving citizens throughout the process results in much better decision-making by our elected officials. This “we know best” attitude is disrespectful at best and destructive at worst.

With election season gearing up again, rest assured you'll be hearing more and more candidates pledge support for governmental transparency. But rather than simply taking their word for it, we must challenge them to explain how exactly they’ll implement transparency. Only through sustained pressure will politicians have any reason to support transparency after their election.

NV stimulus website rockets to middle of the pack

2010-01-28T15:32:00.000-08:00

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

2010-01-28T15:27:00.000-08:00

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

2010-01-28T15:26:00.000-08:00

(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

2010-01-20T13:07:00.000-08:00

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...

2010-01-14T20:46:00.000-08:00

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

Grade inflation in D.C.

2010-01-13T11:28:00.000-08:00

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

2010-01-13T11:23:00.000-08:00

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

2010-01-11T14:28:00.000-08:00

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!

2010-01-05T10:46:00.000-08:00

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

2010-01-05T08:45:00.000-08:00

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.

Obama announces new disclosure rules

2009-12-29T19:40:00.001-08:00

In an update to a story we brought you back in November, President Obama has announced new rules governing the declassification process of hundreds of millions of currently classified documents:

President Obama declared on Tuesday that “no information may remain classified indefinitely” as part of a sweeping overhaul of the executive branch’s system for protecting classified national security information.

In an executive order and an accompanying presidential memorandum to agency heads, Mr. Obama signaled that the government should try harder to make information public if possible, including by requiring agencies to regularly review what kinds of information they classify and to eliminate any obsolete secrecy requirements.

While imposing a four-year deadline to clear out 400+ million currently backlogged classified documents, Obama also created a "National Declassification Center" in the National Archives to facilitate the declassification efforts.

The success of these reforms depend on how faithfully they are implemented by the agencies involved. Only through a coordinated and proactive effort do these reforms stand any chance of success. For too long those in power have favored secrecy over openness and opaqueness over transparency. Changing that mindset will not happen overnight, but I hope this directive will move them in the right direction.

However, as I've said much too often with this Administration, I'll believe it when I see it.

Shame on you, Judge Glass

2009-12-28T20:41:00.001-08:00

The Nevada Supreme Court has ruled that the full questionnaires filled out by jurors in the O.J. Simpson robbery and kidnapping case be released to the public.

District Judge Jackie Glass redacted portions of the questionnaires before releasing them the day after the guilty verdicts were delivered. Judge Glass ruled the forms should be withheld because she "promised" the jurors they would remain private.

One would hope a relatively respected judge would realize that personal commitments do not trump the law of the land, but apparently Judge Glass needed a reminder. Thankfully, the Supreme Court's decision delivered one:

We further conclude that juror questionnaires used in jury selection are, like the jury-selection process itself, presumptively subject to public disclosure. The presumption of openness may be overcome, however, only if the district court identifies a countervailing interest to public access and demonstrates, by specific findings, that closure is necessary and narrowly tailored to serve a higher interest.

The Court's decision reaffirms the common-sense doctrine that public documents should be made open by default. Judge Glass and other public officials should take note of this decision and adjust their attitudes towards transparency accordingly.

Will any candidates post their contributions online?

2009-12-23T08:00:00.000-08:00

Who says there's no bipartisanship any more? Both Mike Zahara (on the left) and Chuck Muth (on the right) are calling for candidates in Nevada to post campaign contributions online within 48 hours of receiving them.

Mike Zahara:

I’ve always been a goo-goo—a good government guy—and sure I support Rory Reid’s read on a ‘Foundation of Rust’ … ooops, I mean Trust, however, it is really lacking any semblance of teeth, is missing electronic donation reporting within 48 hours, and missing strengthening, including mandatory jail, for those who blow off ethics and campaign laws.

Chuck Muth:

Blogger Mike Zahara is on the Left. I’m on the Right. And we both agree that all campaign donations should be posted on the Internet within 48 hours. And even though there’s no law COMPELLING candidates touting ethics reform and transparency (hello, Rory Reid!) to post all of their contributions on a public website on a regular basis, there’s also nothing PREVENTING them from leading by example and doing so voluntarily. Any takers?

Will any candidates give an early Christmas gift to taxpayers and make this commitment? We'll let you know if they do.

Cross posted at Write on Nevada.

Top 10 ethics scandals of 2009

2009-12-22T11:09:00.000-08:00

As the year wraps up, the Citizens for Ethics and Responsibility in Washington (CREW) has released their list of top ethics scandals of 2009.

Singled out is TARP receiving/bonus getting executives; the SEC's total inability to stop Bernie Madoff's $65 billion ponzi scheme; a feckless FEC; John Ensign, John Murtha, Mark Sanford and Charlie Rangel all providing a less than upstanding example of ethical behavior; a Congress that won't police their own; and finally an undrained swamp that still stinks up all of D.C.

More than a few of President Obama's nominees had tax troubles, including Tom Daschle, Timothy Geithner and Nancy Killefer. While Daschle and Killefer both ultimately withdrew their nominations, Geithner went on to become the nation's Treasury Secretary. You know, the department in charge of collecting taxes.

On the transparency front in 2009, I was most disheartened with the White House's breaking its promise to wait five days before signing bills. If Obama has any political sense, I would highly recommend he wait the five days before signing the health care bill if/when it passes. There will be a lot of unhappy people in the wake of that bill, and it wouldn't make sense to upset transparency-minded individuals as well.

Make sure to read CREW's whole report.

Nevada's toothless Ethics Commission

2009-12-21T14:04:00.000-08:00

Following up on councilman Steve Ross' violation of state ethics laws, the Sun examines the distinction between willful and non-willful violations:

Ignorance of the law is no excuse for breaking it, the old legal saw goes. But that is not the case when it comes to Nevada’s ethics laws.

Nevada politicians who violate ethics laws face no penalties if their acts are not deemed "willful."

Apparently this neutered, "all bark and no bite" Commission acts this way by design:

Regardless, Ross’ case demonstrates what critics say is a shortcoming in Nevada law — namely, that even when elected officials violate ethics laws, they typically face neither penalties nor the potential to be removed from office.

That’s not by coincidence. The commission has decided that its primary job is to teach public officials about ethical conduct rather than punishing them, according to its executive director, Caren Jenkins.

Removing politicians from office, she said, is the job of voters. (emphasis mine)

Left unsaid is that both the Commission and the voters have a job. While it certainly is the voter's job to remove politicians from office if the need arises, it should also be the Commission's job to go after ethics violators with more than a slap on the wrist and an ethics pamphlet.

Skimming through Rory Reid's new plan for transparency and ethics in government, I found his intention to close this willful/non-willful distinction encouraging:

Impose "strict liability" for ethics violations

Currently, if the Nevada Ethics Commission rules that a violation was "non-willful," violators essentially get off penalty-free. This practice is dubious and encourages citizen cynicism — not to mention violations. Since I plan to institute and require ethics laws training for all state employees, officials and lobbyists, there will be no excuse for not knowing the law or understanding whether one's behavior violates it. there will be no further room for the "non-willful" distinction. I will move to have that loophole removed from law, so that all government officials and employees will be liable for all misconduct.

To top it all off, the 2009 Legislature made it even harder to prove that public officials willingly violate ethics laws:

In the future, it will be more difficult to prove that a politician willfully violated ethics law because of a little-noticed change in the statute made during the 2009 Legislature.

At the urging of ethics commissioners, the Legislature in May clarified the law defining a "willful violation." Instead defining it as something a public officer “knew or reasonably should have known,” the law now defines it as acting "intentionally and knowingly."

I have to imagine this is just the way they like it.

Rory Reid calls for a more transparent Nevada

2009-12-21T10:48:00.000-08:00

Last week, gubernatorial candidate Rory Reid released his plan for increasing government transparency. One of his suggestions caught my attention, because it's a great idea for increasing government transparency.

Establish an open meeting law for the Legislature. I’ll work to establish an open meeting law for the Nevada Legislature that allows the body to conduct its business expeditiously, given the limits of a 120-day legislative session, but places a premium on openness and transparency. All legislative committee hearings, subcommittee hearings and work sessions should be open to the public as a matter of law rather than just standard practice. I’ll work with the legislature to define the parameters of such a law so citizens and the press have consistent, predictable, and open access to the public’s business.

During the last legislative session, Nevada's legislative leaders determined the budget and the record-setting, job-killing, billion-dollar tax increase through a series of secret, closed-door meetings.

These secret meetings were only possible because the legislature included this enormous contradiction when it passed the open-meeting law:

In enacting this chapter, the Legislature finds and declares that all public bodies exist to aid in the conduct of the people’s business. It is the intent of the law that their actions be taken openly and that their deliberations be conducted openly…

The Legislature is specifically excluded from the Open Meeting Law. NRS 241.015(3).

Since the Legislature, as a whole, is not governed, none of its various committees or subcommittees are governed by the law while the full Legislature is in session.

If Reid really wants to establish an open-meeting law for the legislature, all he would need to do is delete the line that says "'Public body' does not include the Legislature of the State of Nevada." I also hope he's not the only candidate to reject this legislative double standard.

I haven't had time to evaluate the other parts of Reid's report, but I was disappointed that it didn't include a mention of improving the state's searchable budget database. From the Nevada News Bureau:

Reid said he is not familiar with what would be involved in making state government budgets, expenditures and contracts totally transparent on a searchable database. Nor is he proposing any changes right now to the way candidate campaign contribution and expense reports are available for public review.

Maybe leaving out the searchable budget database was an oversight, because it's an idea with deep bi-partisan support. If Rory Reid wants any information on the searchable budget database, here's a great place to start. And if that's not enough, we're only a phone call or e-mail away.

Cross posted on Write on Nevada.