Recovery Board Unveils New Tool to Analyze Stimulus Spending

The government's chief watchdog for stimulus spending rolled out a new tool Thursday that allows users to compare stimulus dollars spent with jobs data and other metrics.

The Recovery Explorer tool also can display data at the national, state, county and congressional district level and organize it by fiscal year, quarter or total funding.

The tool was designed by Smartronix, the Recovery and Transparency Board's main contractor for its Recovery.gov website, and SAP.

SAP staff developed the Explorer tool in just 30 days, the company's co-CEO Bill McDermott told an audience of federal information technology workers and contractors Wednesday, touting it as an example of private-sector efficiency aiding government communications and transparency.

McDermott was the keynote speaker at an awards dinner hosted by the TechAmerica Foundation, a technology industry group. He said his company will market the platform Recovery Outlook was built on to government customers as a general information analysis tool.

The Recovery Board has won high praise for effectively watchdogging stimulus recipients and for making information on stimulus spending rapidly available online, even from die-hard opponents of the stimulus itself, such as Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

The Obama administration and Congress are separately considering plans to adopt the recovery board's reporting model to track spending governmentwide.

This post was corrected to reflect Bill McDermott's correct title.