The Transparency Measure Connecticut ‘Government Reformers’ Fear

February 14, 2008

Barack Obama has developed a well-deserved reputation as an “all style, no substance” cipher adored by the millions of silly Americans who look to government and politicians for their health, happiness, and economic security.

But before the Obamamania contagion infected much of the Nutmeg State and the nation, the Illinois senator was involved in at least one piece of federal legislation that didn’t lead to higher taxes and bigger government. In fact, it struck a blow for transparency -- and, one hope, frugality -- by opening federal spending to wider public scrutiny.

The “Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act,” shepherded through Congress in 2006 by Obama and Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, created an online database citizens can use to find the companies, unions, state/local government agencies, and nonprofit organizations that receive federal contracts, grants, and loans. The website, www.federalspending.gov, debuted in December.

Inspired by spending-transparency progress at the federal level, a broad coalition of pro-taxpayer organizations -- including Citizens Against Government Waste, The Sam Adams Alliance, the National Taxpayers Union, and Americans for Tax Reform -- began pushing for similar online databases at the state level. In Connecticut, State Rep. William A. Hamzy (R-Bristol) carried the banner for “Google government” during 2007’s legislative session, by submitting a bill “to create a searchable web site, accessible to the public, to provide information about state grants, contracts, projects and loans.”

A legislative greenhorn would have assumed that the bill, which was referred to the General Assembly’s Government Administration and Elections Committee, faced certain passage. After all, isn’t Connecticut, one of the first states to create of Freedom of Information Commission and a recent adopter of “clean elections” legislation, all about good government?

Veteran observers of the Nutmeg State’s public sector knew better.

State Rep. Christopher Caruso, the sanctimonious legislative careerist from Bridgeport who chairs the Government Administration and Elections Committee, never got behind the bill. It was granted neither a public hearing nor a vote, and while Hamzy remains committed to its passage, Caruso has shown little interest.

Evidently, only one brand of government “reform” is permitted in Connecticut: measures that create more power and authority for incumbent politicians and bureaucrats. Whether it’s a (possibly unconstitutional) ban on campaign contributions from unfashionable sources, publicly funded (and citizen-opposed) elections, or a full-time (and better-compensated) legislature, Connecticut’s self-professed advocates for “good government” are obsessed with the demand side of the political game. Control the ability of “special interests” to seek favors and perks, Common Causers and their ilk tell us, and corruption will wither.

More thoughtful analysts understand that the supply side -- i.e., politicians with no desire to control spending and an eagerness to reward their cronies -- is the true cause of uncontrollable, arrogant, and downright sleazy government. That’s why mechanisms that restrain politicians’ appetite to spend, not laws targeting lobbyists’ desire for preferential legislation, are preferable as corruption-fighting tools. For example, many states constitutionally prohibit direct forms of corporate welfare. Others have meaningful expenditure limits. (As opposed to Connecticut’s “spending cap,” which has been a loophole-filled dead letter since its inception.)

A spending-transparency website represents a step, finally, toward the right kind of government reform in the Nutmeg State. (And it’s not as if Connecticut doesn’t already have a pilot version online -- Comptroller Nancy Wyman has made her database of bond allocations available on the web for years.) But at least for now, the proposal is going nowhere.

In 1802, Thomas Jefferson wrote: “We might hope to see the finances of the Union as clear and intelligible as a merchant’s books, so that every member of Congress and every man of any mind in the Union should be able to comprehend them, to investigate abuses, and consequently to control them.”

The Sage of Monticello didn’t foresee the Internet, but his advice is being followed in the digital age. Last year spending-transparency measures were adopted by Republican and Democratic lawmakers and governors in Kansas, Minnesota, Hawaii, Oklahoma, Texas, and Minnesota. (Three more were created by gubernatorial executive orders.) At least 18 states are considering legislation this year. Efforts are now being made at the local level, and government officials in the United Kingdom and even Iraq are examining ways to post their expenditures online.

Adjusted for inflation and population, state spending in Connecticut ballooned by a factor of five between 1970 and 2005. Nutmeg State taxpayers who wonder where all that money is going should ask why lawmakers and Governor Rell can’t be bothered to implement a low-cost technology that would provide some answers.

D. Dowd Muska is a writer, commentator and public-policy researcher. He can be reached at muskacolumn@cox.net.

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