OpenTheGovernment.org just came out with its annual Secrecy Report Card, which keeps tracks of the latest trends in secrecy and transparency across the federal government. Overall, the report points to “slight decreases in secrecy in a number of areas in the executive branch” in 2008.
Flipping through the report, we were particularly interested in the following findings (full disclosure: POGO is a member of OTG’s steering committee):
- Backlogs for Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests were slightly reduced in 2008, as the government processed 17,689 more FOIA requests than it received. There was also a decrease in the total number of FOIA requests submitted and the amount of money spent processing those requests.
- Qui tam lawsuits — cases where whistleblowers sue on behalf of the government — accounted for almost 78% of the $1.34 billion recovered in FY 2008 government fraud cases.
- The use of full and open competition in federal contracts dropped from 45% of contract dollars in FY 2000 to only 36% in FY 2008; meanwhile, the percentage of contracts not competed at all rose from 23% in FY 2000 to 27% in FY 2008.
- More than 65% of the 6,840 meetings of federal advisory committees that full under the Federal Advisory Committee Act were closed to the public in 2008.
The report also compares the transparency websites for the bailout and the stimulus, and examines the Obama administration’s “mixed record” on classification, FOIA, presidential signing statements, the State Secrets Privilege, and more. Click here to read the full report.
-- Michael Smallberg
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