States' stimulus tracking sites are mediocre at best, report finds

A study released on Wednesday criticizes most state Web sites that track stimulus spending, specifically finding fault with their coverage of job creation, contract awards and geographic location of projects.

Good Jobs First, a Washington research center that co-chairs the Coalition for An Accountable Recovery, issued the report as part of its effort to hold President Obama accountable for enacting what he called "a plan that will be implemented with an unprecedented level of transparency and accountability." The nonprofit coalition consists of nearly 35 public interest groups.

The average score for general Web site performance was 28.2 on a scale of 0 to 100. The study evaluated the sites' disclosures on planned spending totals in broad categories, geographic distribution of that spending statewide, and specific contracts intended to create jobs.

"The paramount objective of the Recovery Act is to address mounting unemployment through job creation and retention," the report stated. "Yet only four states -- Colorado, Maryland, Washington and West Virginia -- currently provide any employment data for individual projects on their main [Recovery Act] site."

The administration has called on all 50 states and the District of Columbia to create individual stimulus-tracking sites that supplement the official federal site, Recovery.gov. The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board is responsible for the quality of Recovery.gov, but not the state sites.

The authors acknowledged that the overall responsibility for reporting transparency rests primarily with the RAT board, which maintains Recovery.gov, but said, "at the very least, the state sites should mirror the information provided by the federal sites."

The findings also noted that states failed to use widely available Web tools, such as geographic information systems software. California-based ESRI, a major provider of GIS modeling and mapping technology, has customers in every state that already are using its software, according the report.

"It may be that they are not aware of" the GIS capacity the state already has, said Philip Mattera, the center's research director and the principal author of the study.

Among the handful of exceptional states that scored 50 or higher were Maryland, which scored 80, and West Virginia, which earned a 60. Meanwhile, Illinois and Utah failed to score any points for their sites.

"There is a role for the states that complements what the board is doing at the federal level, and we think most of the states could be doing a better job in that regard," Mattera said.

"We're not blaming the federal level about any shortcomings at the state level," he added. "The states have a role in providing more detail on individual projects than a site that's providing [data] on the whole country."

Only a few states, such as Maryland and California, juxtaposed the geographic disbursement of funds with patterns of economic distress, such as county unemployment rates or foreclosure levels, the report noted.

The study also looked at the states' reporting of highway projects, in particular, since those contracts are expected to kick-start the economy. Those scores, 37.8 on average, were higher than the overall scores. Many states displayed information on transportation projects outside of their main recovery sites, on a separate page, or on their transportation department's Web site.

Alabama, the District of Columbia, Kentucky and Vermont scored very low on both their overall sites and their highway reporting, dispensing few specifics on how they are spending stimulus funds.

Most states -- 42 -- did a relatively good job of providing data on the broad categories of spending, which included energy, housing and transportation. Breakdowns by county were less common on sites, with only 18 states providing such location-based information. Oregon, Tennessee and Washington displayed data by counties using interactive maps.