What Is Government Transparency?

On January 20th, 2009, President Obama gave an inauguration speech that included the following:

The President was speaking of a transparency and an accountability that will restore and revitalize the trust between citizens and their government. In order to do business in this way, two things must happen: the government’s critical decisions must be deliberated on and made during public meetings or hearings and these public meetings must be accessible to anyone and everyone, live and on-demand.

These concepts should sound very familiar to anyone who has participated in local politics. Your city council and school board meetings have strict rules requiring that their business is done during open public meetings, with detailed agendas including all of the supporting documentation for every item and definitive rules for how long each item needs to be considered or discussed. These rules ensure that each government agency does its work “in the light of day” and that citizens have all of the relevant information and adequate time to prepare to participate in these meetings.

Until recently, however, attending and participating in these meetings was physically challenging. You had to attend in person, which meant traveling to city hall at a particular day and time that may not have been convenient or possible. But low levels of attendance and participation should not be mistaken for a lack of interest: as the convenience of accessing meetings improves, participation increases dramatically. For example, over 1,400 citizens watched and listened live to a recent meeting of the Tennessee State Legislature through its website. Thousands more watched and listened to segments of the meeting ondemand starting the next morning. But fewer than one hundred citizens attended this meeting in person.

Public meetings must be available to the public in order for citizens to understand the “why” behind government decisions and actions. The reasoning and intentions of government leaders is just as important as the final decision and providing constituents with this insight will engage citizens and help the government make better decisions.

To illustrate this point, asking the government to simply post its budget online would be like receiving a failing report card from your child and then simply waiting to see how they do next semester instead of investigating and taking action. Our government has been receiving failing grades for some time now, and the only time the average citizen can truly participate or collaborate in the legislative process is during scheduled public meetings with definitive and descriptive agendas. As the President has noted, engaging the public will benefit government leaders by improving their effectiveness and the decisions they make.

The government’s financial dealings do deserve considerable transparency. Some of the government’s most important tools are financial incentives, disincentives and spending. All three should be reported on clearly, including where the government’s funds come from, any quantified tax breaks or subsidies, and actual spending. The granularity of this data should not be in billions or even millions, but in thousands of dollars. All of these financial transactions should be standard agenda items during public meetings to give taxpayers not only the data, but also guidance in interpreting the numbers and the thinking behind them.

Imagine if a visit to the Recovery.gov website not only presented elegant pie charts and news showing where billions of taxpayer dollars is being spent, but also included access to live and on-demand public meetings from every company, government agency and non-profit that received $10 million or more in TARP funds. You could select from Bank of America, General Motors, AIG, U.S. Labor Department, the Department of Energy, etc. and watch live as they present to the American public a monthly report on their use of taxpayer dollars, all based on standardized agenda and meeting processes. Would you watch?

Government transparency should no longer be limited to publishing the results of government proceedings and decisions and posting them in a hallway somewhere. Technology makes it possible to observe government as it works, balances priorities, determines tradeoffs, and makes decisions. Transparency and government openness begin with public meetings, which should be conveniently available to all citizens online.