Transmittal of “12-point Transparency Agenda,” to the mayor and city council

 

 

Transparency Agenda for Cincinnati

You can never be too demanding when it comes to government transparency. It is just the nature of the beast for the government to keep as much information “non-public” (i.e., secret) as possible. Cincinnati seems  to be particularly bad but I do not have a frame of reference at this point except the federal government.

The Ohio Open Records law is very different from the federal Freedom of Information Act. And the city’s practices for administering the open records law is more substandard than anything I experienced in the federal government. So, reforming the way the city handles records requests is at the top of the “Transparency Agenda.”

At the outset of the budget process, when members of city council submitted their individual “Budget Recommendations,” I decided to submit my own budget recommendation.  At the April 7, 2025 meeting of the Budget and Finance Committee, I claimed my “2 minutes” of the public comment period to read my transparency agenda into the record. I considered it a budget recomemendation because any government reform requires money.

I followed up by sending the agenda to the mayor and city council via email. I did not receive a response from anyone.

I also discuss the transparency agenda in Episode 20 of the podcast.