Blog Posts and Analysis / Revenue & Spending

Agency Plans Add Another Element of Accountability to Recovery Act Spending

On May 17, the Obama administration released the next wave of Recovery Act information, this time by posting Agency Recovery Plans on Recovery.gov. These plans, which are mandated by the Recovery Act, include broad, agency-wide plans and program-specific plans on how each federal agency intends to expend its appropriated Recovery Act funds. Like other Recovery Act-related data dissemination, this latest phase in Recovery Act spending transparency marks another move in the right direction but needs some refinement.

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Recovery Act Transparency in 51 Flavors: A Sample of State Recovery Act Websites

An informal OMB Watch survey of eight state-level Recovery Act websites reveals that the access to and quality of information on Recovery Act expenditures varies widely from state to state.




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Congress Passes FY 2010 Budget Resolution

On April 29, exactly 100 days into the Obama administration, the House and Senate each passed a final version of the Fiscal Year 2010 budget resolution. The final resolution outlines $3.56 trillion in spending and tracks closely with President Obama's major proposals, including key investments in health care, education, and energy.

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Coalition for an Accountable Recovery Submits Comments on Recovery.gov Guidance Memo

On April 17, the Coalition for an Accountable Recovery (CAR) submitted its comments on the Office of Management and Budget's (OMB) April 3 memo, "Updated Implementing Guidance for the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009." The memo is a supplement to a previous set of guidelines issued Feb. 18 to federal agencies on the implementation of the Recovery Act. CAR notes that OMB’s efforts are laudable and that the guidance is helpful in advancing transparency and accountability with regard to Recovery Act spending. However, the coalition also argues that the guidance still needs modification for meaningful transparency and accountability to be realized.

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House, Senate Pass Budget Resolutions

The House and Senate each passed their budget resolutions on April 2, mostly along party lines, before breaking for a two-week spring recess. The resolutions delineate approximately $3.6 trillion in spending for Fiscal Year 2010 and track closely with the major proposals outlined by President Barack Obama, including estimates of historic budget deficits. Those deficits could become significantly worse due to the adoption of an amendment in the Senate that calls for further cuts to the estate tax, benefiting the richest families in the country.

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Recovery Transparency Meets Mixed Results

Three weeks after President Barack Obama signed into law the $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act), states have begun to see federal economic stimulus funds move within their borders. Behind the hundreds of billions of dollars soon to follow are some 25 federal departments, agencies, and administrations that are in charge of allocating the funds. In addition to this unprecedented level of emergency spending is a pledge by Obama to "watch the taxpayers' money with more rigor and transparency than ever." The speed at which the administration and some federal agencies have moved is impressive, even as there has been uneven implementation of transparency efforts.

Find out more from the Coalition for an Accountable Recovery

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Stimulus Becomes Law; Implementation Begins

When President Barack Obama signed into law a $787 billion economic stimulus package on Feb. 17, he also approved an unprecedented set of transparency and oversight provisions. The law calls for the establishment of a Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board to oversee the disbursement of more than $500 billion in federal cash outlays and a website to publicly track the spending.

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