Agencies' open government plans receive mostly positive reviews

By Aliya Sternstein,
Senior Correspondent

| April 7, 2010

Those posted by Health and Human Services, Transportation, and the Environmental Protection Agency are praised for specificity, while critics say others are too vague.

President Obama called for the open government plans in a directive issued in December 2009. Alex Brandon/AP

Agencies capped a 14-month endeavor on Wednesday when they released plans outlining how they will use Internet-based technologies in retooling operations to open the federal government to the public.

The documents varied in complexity, with some running more than 60 pages, but initial reactions are largely positive. The Obama administration and outside independent government transparency advocates are in the process of auditing the plans.

The documents are the result of an open government initiative that President Obama launched with a memo his first day in office, calling for increased transparency, civic engagement and collaboration with outside groups.

A presidential directive issued in December 2009, which incorporated suggestions from the public, formally ordered agencies to specify in individual open government plans how they will comply with the three principles in carrying out their missions.

"For too long, Washington has closed itself off from the oversight of the American public, resulting in information that's difficult to find, taxpayer dollars that disappear without a trace and lobbyists that wield undue influence," Obama said in a statement on Wednesday. "Now that these plans are published online, we hope the American people will play their part and collaborate with us to provide oversight and improve upon this information. Together, we won't just build a more efficient and effective government, but a stronger democracy as well."

Watchdog groups generally were pleased with the open government plans. "The amount of effort that has been put in is pretty amazing," said Amy Fuller Bennett, program associate at openthegovernment.org, a coalition of transparency activists. "We think in general, this is a massive step forward and will be a key requirement to changing way the government does its business. We're really excited about the plans, [but] we're more excited in seeing how plans are being implemented."

The administration has directed agencies to solicit public feedback on their plans and to make the appropriate changes.

The key part of each plan is a flagship initiative that injects one of the three tenets of open government into a major agency undertaking. For example, as part of the Health and Human Services Department's plan, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is developing a Web site that tracks the costs associated with treating Medicare patients in particular diagnosis-related groups, by state, illness and individual hospital. A test version is live. CMS' next major release is expected in the fall.

HHS' plan goes beyond the directive's requirements by describing not one, but five flagship activities. One of the more elaborate programs will by year's end harvest data sets describing health care performance based on quality, cost, access and disease rates -- from the national to the county level.

"Agencies like HHS, [the Environmental Protection Agency] and [the Transportation Department] set the bar really high," said Sean Moulton, director of federal information policy at OMB Watch. "That might be because of how these agencies work. They might be used to transparency more than others."

He praised HHS' proposal for its specificity and clear deliverables. Conversely, Moulton criticized the Housing and Urban Development Department's plan for its ambiguity. In the plan , the department discusses a flagship initiative called the innovation lab. "The innovation lab could explore the possibility of utilizing geolocated texting services to inform its most vulnerable customers about critical services in emergency situations," the plan noted.

Compared to HHS' explicit deadlines, "HUD felt a little less concrete," Moulton said.

A HUD spokesman said the department didn't want to create a plan that seemed predetermined and set in stone. "The plan is meant to be a living document -- something like a wiki -- that will invite people to be part of the discussion," said Jerry Brown referring to Web pages that anyone can edit.

Federal Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra, who architected much of the open government directive, told reporters on Wednesday the White House will hold agencies accountable for producing quality plans by measuring them against the criteria outlined in the directive. By May 1, the administration's findings will be posted on a site that tracks agencies' compliance with the initiative.

But government transparency groups have criticized the existing online score card for simply checking off whether an agency has completed steps outlined in the directive.

"We welcome criticism. We welcome feedback," Chopra responded on Wednesday. He said the White House still is determining which metrics to use in judging the plans and will review outside groups' independent analyses of the plans.

"We will take account, and serious account, of the reviews," added Norm Eisen, special counsel to the president for ethics and government reform. "We certainly commit to do that not only with groups but also the American people. "

Some former administration officials said agencies will struggle to implement their plans unless they overhaul their underlying information technology. "Today, to meet the president's mandate, agencies have had to go back and decide what data they could make available for publishing," stated Molly O'Neill, a former chief information officer at the Environment Protection Agency and now a vice president at the consulting firm CGI. "For open government to succeed, agencies need to change their enterprise architectures and/or system design and planning processes to include data sharing as an organic goal so new systems produce sharable data as a matter of course."

Dawn Lim contributed to this article.

Agencies' open government plans

Health and Human Services

Homeland Security

Housing and Urban Development

Justice

Labor