Project of The Sunlight Foundation    
The Open House Project from The Sunlight Foundation

Recent Passed and Pending Transparency Reform Legislation

January 23rd, 2008 by John Wonderlich · No Comments

From the Open House Project Google Group discussion, here’s a partial list of recent transparency reform legislation, passed or pending.

Transparency bills that passed in 110th Congress, 1st session:

1. S.1 Honest Leadership and Open Government Act of 2007:

  • Requires online posting of committee hearing transcripts/audio/video (Senate only)
  • Expands lobbyist disclosure to require quarterly filing, disclosure of bundled contributions, mandatory electronic filing and maintenance of online databases, disclosure of past executive branch and congressional experience, mandatory electronic filing and maintenance of online databases for foreign lobbyists
  • Disclosure of employment negotiations for Members and staff
  • Creation of online databases for travel reports (House and Senate) and personal financial disclosure (House only)
  • Disclosure of earmarks in bills online (loopholes, of course, exist)

2. S.2488 OPEN Government Act of 2007:

  • Encourages faster FOIA response time in agencies
  • Enables FOIA requesters to track the status of their requests
  • Brings contractors under FOIA
  • Expands the basis to waive fees for FOIA duplication
  • Creates an Office of Government Information within NARA

3. OTA funding implemented as part of GAO:

Other developments during 110th Congress, 1st session:

  1. C-SPAN changed its copyright policy to allow reproduction on the Web
  2. Seven Members of Congress posted daily schedules to their official Web sites
  3. Two Members of Congress posted their personal financial disclosures to their official Web sites
  4. The number of Members blogging and posting their earmarks increased dramatically
  5. Launch of OMB spending and earmark online database
  6. Launch of FARA online database
  7. Redesign of SOPR lobbyist disclosure online database

Pending for 110th Congress, 2nd session:  (see also here )

  1. S.2321 E-Government Reauthorization Act of 2007 (Hearings held in the Senate)
  2. Review of Franking Regulations for Member Web sites
  3. H.R.1362 Accountability in Contracting Act of 2007 (Passed the House)
  4. S. Res. 401 A resolution to provide Internet access to certain Congressional Research Service publications
  5. Lieberman’s statement that Senate votes should be in XML, in support of THOMAS upgrades

Two more pieces of transparency reform legislation underway for 2008:
First, the Presidential Library Donation Reform Act of 2007, (HR
1254<http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h110-1254>)
saying <http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-1254>… *”Any
Presidential library fundraising organization shall submit on a quarterly
basis, in accordance with paragraph (2), information with respect to…”
*Second, here’s the Presidential Records Acts Amendments of 2007, (HR
1255<http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h110-1255>)
saying <http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-1255>…
“`(a)(1) When the Archivist determines under this chapter to make available
to the public any Presidential record that has not previously been made
available to the public, the Archivist shall…” and “Executive Order No.
13233, dated November 1, 2001 (66 Fed. Reg. 56025), shall have no force or
effect.” among other things.  (link to executive
order<http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/11/20011101-12.html>
)
Again, the OHP page<http://www.theopenhouseproject.com/resources/pendingbills>also
has legislation on Congress relevant to the report as well.

Tags: Congress · House of Representatives · OpenHouse · library of congress

0 responses so far ↓

  • There are no comments yet...Kick things off by filling out the form below.

Leave a Comment