Web sites open a window into state spending
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By Louis Porter Vermont Press Bureau - Published: July 7, 2009
MONTPELIER – With the help of the Internet and some encouragement from Vermonters inside and outside state government, taxpayers have a greater ability than ever to find out how their money is being used – and how they can cash in on that spending.
An unlikely collaboration of the free-market Ethan Allen Institute and the liberal-leaning Public Assets Institute has produced a new site called Vermont Transparency. The Web site was built with about $58,000 of money from the State Policy Network, a national gathering of free market groups, but its content is politically and ideological neutral.
That was one reason Jack Hoffman and Paul Cillo of the Public Assets Institute could collaborate on the Web site effectively with the Ethan Allen Institute, said its president, John McClaughry.
"The fact that it is content neutral makes it easier to swallow," McClaughry said. The two think tanks agree that the public should have – and needs – accurate information.
"We disagree on pretty much everything else," he said.
Their Web site is partly a centralized list of links to other, mostly state government, Web sites. But, in addition to putting those in one place, it also includes guides to how to use those sites – and gathers together reports and spreadsheets as well.
"I am not sure a lot of people know where to go for the information," said Hoffman, who has done much of the work on the project. "Nearly all the information that is on the site is public information but we hope to put it in a format that is easier to use and make it easier for people to get to."
In some cases public databases that are in other formats are easier to use if put into spreadsheets so anyone who is interested can calculate and work with the figures, Hoffman said.
There is no hiding from the fact that the information made available through the site could be used to argue against the views he takes, or the case that the Public Assets Institute makes, McClaughry said.
"Who knows? I might be used in ways I don't like very well, or that Paul and Jack don't like very well, but that is the chance we took," he said. And it is part of the reason the collaboration worked.
Hoffman, a former reporter with the Vermont Press Bureau, said he is not sure who will use the Web site, although he suspects that reporters will be one group that will. But he hopes that as the Legislature and the administration some years ago agreed to make joint projections of state revenues instead of disagreeing about base assumptions that those of different policy perspectives can at least start at the same point.
"We have different views on policy but we both believe that good policy starts with good information," he said. "We shouldn't be fighting over numbers."
Vermont Transparency, started at the beginning of the month, is the newest, but far from the only Web site that gives interested Vermonters a view into budgets and spending.
The Web site of the Legislature's Joint Fiscal Office – lawmakers' budget writers and analysts – has become a clearinghouse for documents and reports related to state spending. New revenue forecasts and other memos and studies, both by lawmakers and the administration, are often posted there within minutes of being issued. Budget proposals appear there as they are completed, as do reports of actual tax and fee receipts for each of the state's major funds.
The Legislature has had a fiscal Web site for years, but began including administrative proposals and documents when joint revenue estimates began a few years ago, said Stephen Klein, chief fiscal officer for Vermont's Legislature.
"We try to have up there documents that the Legislature and the administration put forward," he said. The site is now a main source of such information, along with one hosted by Gov. James Douglas' administration Department of Finance and Management.
The state also has a site devoted to tracking and explaining federal stimulus or American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding in Vermont, how to get it and where it is going.
Part of what is included on that site was required by the federal legislation that created the federal stimulus program, said Tom Evslin, the head of the state's office of economic stimulus and recovery.
But the state's recovery Web site goes far beyond what is required by law and is now being redesigned to more clearly answer the most common question Vermonters have about the stimulus money – how do I get some – Evslin said.
"The most frequent question we get is 'is there a way that I personally, or my community, or my company can benefit from these stimulus funds'," he said.
The Web site is not without risk of embarrassment for the state government, Evslin said.
"If there is an outrageous expenditure on a project we have to report it," he said. And his office is not making any secret of wanting, for instance, money from competitive grants for broadband Internet improvements. It will, therefore, be easy to see if they fail, Evslin said.
"It will be clear we did not succeed at what we set out to do" if they don't, he said.
Another of Vermont's state fiscal Web sites is unusual as well. The Web site of State Treasurer Jeb Spaulding's office includes, as would be expected, general information about the state-managed pension funds for state employees, teachers and municipal workers.
But the site also includes details of how and where those pension funds are invested, to a degree that may be unique, Spaulding said.
"You can go on there and see a snapshot of what our current pension system is or review every investment," he said.
Here are the addresses of some of those Web sites:
http://www.vttransparency.org
http://www.leg.state.vt.us/JFO
http://finance.vermont.gov
http://recovery.vermont.gov
http://www.vermonttreasurer.gov
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