Projo Politics Blog

For anyone interested in how Rhode Island's part-time lawmakers earn their living, the state Ethics Commission has an early Christmas present.

For the first time, the commission has posted online the latest financial disclosure statement filed by each of the state's general officers - the governor, lieutenant governor, state treasurer, secretary of state and attorney general - and every current state legislator.

The filings can be found under the heading "financial disclosure'' on the Ethics Commission's web page: http://www.ethics.ri.gov/disclosure/

Ethics Commission lawyer Jason Gramitt said the Web site furthers the goal of having an a "more honest and open government."

Gramitt said the posting is part of a broader attempt to make the site easier to navigate and also to put more information on the site, including complaints, settlement agreements and "all of our decisions and orders in contested cases back to 1998.''

He credited staff attorney Esme DeVault and legal assistant Michelle Berg with doing the work, at no extra expense to the state.

All candidates for the legislature were also required to file financial disclosure statement within 30 days of officially entering their race, so those are available on request but not yet online. At some point, Gramitt said, the commission will likely upload those filings along with those of the major-decision makers in the cities and towns, including city and town council members, mayors and town managers.

Gramitt said the commission wanted to start with "baby-steps'' to make sure "it works and there are no unforeseen consequences.''

The financial filings of Congress members have long been available online from a variety of sources, and saavy Internet surfers would have found the 2007 filings of the governor, legislators, judges, top agency directors and others in Rhode Island - and in many other states - on the Center for Public Integrity web site at http://projects.publicintegrity.org/StateDisclosure/But Rhode Island was not, until now, one of the 20-plus states that made these financial disclosure statements available on the Internet.

 Tags  Center for Public Integrity Esme DeValut financial disclosure Jason Gramitt Michelle Berg Rhode Island Ethics Commission

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