BY SARAH ROSS

PORTLAND- The research group, the Oregon State Public Interest Research Group (OSPIRG), released a report Wednesday giving Oregon the grade of ‘D’ on its openness about government spending.

“The good news is that state governments have become far more transparent about where the money goes,” said Jon Bartholomew, Policy Advocate with OSPIRG. “But Oregon still has lots of room for improvement.”

The report, entitled “FOLLOWING THE MONEY: How the 50 States Rate in Providing Online Access to Government Spending Data,” mentions that a majority of states provide “checkbook-level” detail on government spending reports.

It also says that the best transparency sites include easy searches of government contracts, with the purpose of the contracts and details on government grants and how many jobs they actually create. Oregon’s website is considered an “Emerging State,” as it has little additional funding and is a recent creation.

“Democracy at its essence should be open and transparent to all citizens,” Chair of the Transparency Oregon Advisory Committee, Martha Schrader, D-Canby, stated in a press release Wednesday. “People work hard for their money and are entitled to know where and how their tax money is spent.”

“Oregon’s transparency budget website is just getting off the drawing board,” added Representative Kim Thatcher, R-Keizer. “Over time, we hope the site will become much more comprehensive and user friendly. We believe this is a good first step and it provides a lot of useful information that the public was lacking up to now.”

“Given the current severity of our budget problems, Oregonians need to be confident that they can follow the money,” Bartholomew said. “We will be working hard to improve the user-friendliness of the state transparency website, as well as ensuring more data about tax expenditures will be posted online.”