The Center for Public Integrity : The Data Mine

Congressional Expense Reports Slowly Move Online from Dusty Basement

2010-08-27T16:40:41+00:00

The House of Representatives took a step toward greater government transparency last year by posting its expense reports online, but the clunky PDF format makes it difficult to compare lawmakers’ outlays or to pinpoint exactly how the money is spent. The Senate, on the other hand, is moving at a glacial pace and has yet to offer details about its plan to start publishing expense reports online in 2011.

Consumer Safety Agency Plans Crowdsourced Database

2010-08-24T15:41:30+00:00

Over the objections of manufacturers, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) will launch a searchable, online database in March that collects consumer complaints about harmful or dangerous products.

EPA Releases Toxics Data Early in Spirit of Transparency

2010-08-13T18:14:19+00:00

In response to citizen requests, the Environmental Protection Agency posted its preliminary 2009 Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) data at the end of July, only weeks after the July 1 reporting deadline for U.S. plants to detail their chemical emissions.

ACLU Plans New Attempt to Get Bush Memo on Rendition

2010-08-06T16:49:59+00:00

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is preparing to soon go back to court to obtain a Sept. 17, 2001 memo by then-President George W. Bush that established rendition, the Central Intelligence Agency’s practice of detaining suspected terrorists abroad.

EPA Limits Chemical Accident Data Citing Security Concerns

2010-08-06T16:25:13+00:00

It has been 20 years since Congress included provisions in the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments to inform citizens of risks from factories using hazardous substances, but the data that details the potential effects of accidents at these sites is largely unavailable to the public.

NIH Urged to Create Single Website Showing Grantees’ Funding

2010-08-03T18:11:14+00:00

Dr. Charles Nemeroff’s name is synonymous with what can go wrong when scientists who receive funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the U.S. government’s $31 billion a year medical research arm, fail to disclose business relationships that pose a conflict of interest.

SEC Hurries to Clarify New FOIA Exemption Amid Uproar

2010-07-30T20:36:36+00:00

The head of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission today insisted that language tucked inside the massive financial reform law does not give the agency a broad exemption from Freedom of Information Act requests, as reported by Fox Business Network.

OMB Struggles to Track $80 Billion IT Spending by Government

2010-07-30T13:04:13+00:00

IT Dashboard attempts to tracks billions of dollars spent by the federal government on information technology, but the website itself has out of date information and inaccurate ratings on the investment risks of some agency projects.

Gitmo Detainee Classifications Remain Detached from Identities

2010-07-19T12:00:13+00:00

When the Guantanamo Review Task Force summary report was released in June — more than five months after its completion — it marked the latest step in President Barack Obama’s plan to close the detainee prison in Guantanamo Bay.

Project Updates on Recovery.gov Lack Clarity

2010-07-12T16:33:10+00:00

A Texas company that received $14,675 in economic stimulus money submitted a mandatory progress report to the federal government using just two words: “door mats.” A California solar energy company went to the other extreme, using technical language that gave little insight of what it did with a half-million dollars in taxpayer money.