State
governments contract for goods and services amounting to tens of billions of
dollars, and offer subsidies to encourage economic development, grants and
other spending issues. To insure that
the funds are well spent, accountability and public scrutiny are required.
Right
now all 50 states provide state spending information on the internet, and for
all except CA and VT the info is searchable.
“Transparency 20” refers to meeting the standards.
Take
a look at TRANSPARENCY FLORIDA,
and see how our state spends its money. The
U.S. Public Interest Research Group gave Florida an A- grade for the Transparency
Florida website, and ranked it third in the US for state government
transparency. You may want to subscribe
to Florida’s CFO Jeff Atwater’s weekly DOLLARS AND SENSE
newsletter to keep apprised of what is happening in our state.