bil filed athe beginning of the 81st legislative session mandating that county governments create an online searchable database of their financial records has generated concern among local officials, who say such a database would be too costly to create and maintain for the small benefit it would generate.

House Bill 1039, as it was originally filed by Rep. Ken Paxton, mandates that counties with a population of more than 20,000 create a searchable county expenditure database that must include the amount, date, payor and payee of expenditures as well as a listing of county expenditures. The bill asks that the databases be “intuitive to users,” in that information can be searched by any element found in the database and that the financial information be enhanced through graphs and other analysis. The bill also requires that the county redact private information and personal addresses, and that there cannot be a fee associated with the database. If passed in the original form, the bill would take effect Sept. 1 of this year.

Paxton said he believes the bill, which is currently in the House County Affairs Committee, will benefit taxpayers because it will make information more readily available and decrease the need for complicated Freedom of Information Act requests.

“Online transparency promotes government visibility, public trust and fiscal responsibility be providing clear, unbiased and accurate information to taxpayers,” said Paxton, who represents Collin County. “Texas would serve as a national leader (in transparency) upon the enactment of this legislation.”

While Paxton’s original research into the costs of local government online transparency lead him to believe that counties could create the described database without a significant financial burden — he cited the online check register created by Collin County’s information technology staff, which he said should be a used as a statewide model — officials from rural, suburban and urban counties all said he was mistaken and that the bill would be a significant unfunded mandate if passed.

Collin County’s online check register (which can be found by going to www.co.collin.tx.us, then going to the Auditor’s home page by clicking on the “County Directory” button, and then finding “Financial Transparency” in the right-hand column) allows local residents to find out how many indigent defense cases area attorneys received per month and how much those attorneys were paid each month. Residents can also see that the county gave $4,180 in January to Bob Tomes Ford for auto maintenance and parts, that it purchased $153,365 worth of computer supplies and equipment from CDW-G and that the supplies were used in the county’s animal shelter, district clerk’s office and information technology department — all without leaving their home.

Each month, the county auditor’s office generates a new General Account Check Register report available for interested residents to open and scour over. Collin’s check register report includes an itemized list of each check written to a vendor by the county and is available as a Microsoft Excel worksheet.

The financial database is the latest evolution of the county’s Financial Transparency Project, which started in August 2007. According to Collin County Judge Keith Self, it was the first database of its kind found on a county government Web site.

“We just think it’s the right thing to do, that this is what govern-ment ought to do,” said Self, whose dedication to open government extends into the blogosphere and commissioners court meetings, which the county video tapes and posts online. “You ought to be able to know, as a citizen, where your tax dollars are going.” Self said it didn’t take many taxpayer dollars to produce, though it was part of a larger online financial transparency initiative, and it took a while for the online check register to evolve into its present form. “Our first model was simpler. (The first online check register) was a PDF file so it wasn’t searchable, but we wanted to get started with it and improve it,” Self said, adding that the county made use of the county’s existing software as well as Microsoft Sharepoint software — free at the time, but which now requires user licensing — to produce the Microsoft Excel files. “There’s not a lot of dollars involved here.” Caren Skipworth, the county’s director of information technology, said the process was refined to be as non-time-consuming as possible. Exporting the check register out of the county’s financial system and into Microsoft Excel takes about five minutes, she said. The auditor’s office then filters confidential information — such as that relating to juveniles or the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) — out of the Excel document, which Skipworth said takes an estimated 15-30 minutes. The process happens weekly, she said. The Excel document can then be posted to the Web site using Microsoft Sharepoint. But officials in other counties said it would it would cost them hundreds of thousands to create the database described in Paxton’s bill, largely because they do not have Collin County’s financial software. Several counties also said they would have to purchase new servers and hire additional staff to maintain the site. When The Texas Association of Counties’ County Information Project created a survey to ask officials for financial cost estimates of the project, 74 counties responded. Of those, 53 said they believed the bill would require them to hire more staff members, and the average cost estimate of implementing the bill’s requirements was $118,000. The median figure cited was $50,000; the maximum was $750,000, though most officials said it’d take more time to determine. When asked which financial software vendor they used, only two responding counties used the same software vendor as Collin County; most of those responses were all over the board. More than half the counties surveyed said their financial software does not export data to Microsoft Excel.

Tom Green County Treasurer Dianna Spieker said her county has contacted their software provider about the bill, and received a $150,000-$250,000 estimate just for development of the database — significant enough that the county would have to increase taxes or cut services in another area. The county would also need to purchase and maintain a new server and hire an additional information technology staff member, plus an additional person in the Treasurer’s office to ensure confidential information is properly redacted.

“It’s not a bad thing in theory. In theory, all county officials, we want to support transparency,” Spieker said. “However, we get into the problematics of how do we do that? How do we accomplish that without incurring more cost? Is the benefit of them having the knowledge right there readily available on the Internet, is that benefit worth the cost? … We have to prioritize.”

In Tarrant County, Administrator G.K. Maenius said he didn’t believe the benefits associated with the bill’s financial database would outweigh the costs, and that his county’s taxpayers benefit more from other online transparency initiatives the county has already implemented.

Tarrant County already provides a “vendor check lookup” online, as well as financial statements, for those residents who are fiscally intuitive. However, the county has spent additional resources on building the county’s capacity to videotape, stream and archive commissioners court meetings onto the Internet.

Videos, minutes and agendas of all commissioners court meetings dating back to November 2007 can be viewed online at www.tarrantcounty. com, then clicking on the “Commissioners Court Agenda” button in the middle column. There’s also an archive search feature; if someone wanted to hear about why the commissioners court voted to approve the live streaming video equipment in the first place, all someone has to do is search for “video” and they are given links to the related agenda and the video snippet from the related commissioner’s court meeting. “Transparency is a big issue for us. We want the citizens to be able to watch our governing body in action,” Maenius said. “All the feedback we’ve gotten from our citizens is that they are very appreciative of it.”

The streaming video equipment cost the county $106,625, while the proposed financial database would cost the county an estimated $250,000 to implement and at least $50,000 a year to maintain. Whether one or the other — or both, as Collin County offers residents the exact same feature — is a better use of county dollars should be up to locally elected commissioners to decide. “If we are going to make government more open to the general public, (video) is a good way of doing it,” Maenius said. “Placing another burden like this on the county is, we believe, unwarranted. … I don’t think (residents) would have a use for it. They could call us with their question and we could do a query for them internally. What is the purpose of this? What are we really trying to accomplish?” Tarrant and Collin are not the only counties that have chosen to invest in equipment to broadcast commissioners court meetings online. Travis County has a “Video Replay” link on its home page, www.co.travis.tx.us, as well as a color-coded calendar indicating whether a meeting was a work session, a voting session or a budget hearing. Any resident can click on the Feb. 12 work session, view an agenda, then click the video link associated with the agenda item. El Paso’s meetings are online at www.co.el-paso.tx.us/video; Fort Bend County’s video can be found via its Web site at www.co.fort-bend. tx.us; just find the “County Government” button in the left-hand column then click on “Commissioners Court Online.”

Paxton’s bill is not the only push toward online transparency in the state, nor is it the only way in which the state is attempting to define online transparency for local governments.

The Comptroller of Public Accounts Office is currently implementing a “single set of books” initiative that will result in integrated data and processes for state agencies, according to the Comptroller’s Texas Enterprise Resource Planning Web site, www.texaserp.org. Supporters of that initiative believe creating a single set of books would give state agencies real-time data to determine how much cash is available, eliminate the use of Social Security Numbers as identifiers for state employees and payees, reduce redundancies in payroll personnel across state agencies, and eliminate data conflicts that are often present when financial accounting programs do not interconnect, among other benefits.

However, it has its own pricetag. According to the Comptroller’s implementation plan, finalized in December 2008, the transparency initiative should cost taxpayers between $249 and $285 million over a 7-year implementation period. The plan is that the new system will be developed during the next several fiscal years, with agencies beginning to integrate the software in 2012 and 2013. The process should be completed by 2016.

Earlier this year, Comptroller Susan Combs also announced the Texas Transparency Check Up initiative, which gives Texas taxpayers a one-stop Web portal of information regarding local government transparency, and focuses on which jurisdictions are and are not providing certain financial records — budgets, financial reports and check registers — online.

Counties were not asked to give input on the Check Up before it was launched. Local officials learned about the new initiative after Comptroller Susan Combs held a press conference about it and several other state online transparency endeavors.

The Check Up praises counties and cities that are providing the desired information and highlights model transparency initiatives across the state. It also gives an informal reprimand to cities and counties that are “missing” information, though legally counties with Web sites are only required to post their budgets online, unless they have a population of more than 800,000, in which case they must provide a report of political expenditures as well. There are currently no requirements to post check registers online, though a separate bill filed by Paxton, HB 2743, seeks to change that for counties with populations of more than 50,000.

Legally, counties with Web sites are also required to post the county treasurer’s report, conflicts disclosure documents, tax-rate increases, notices of tax-rate increase hearings and open meetings, open meeting agendas, county utility usage, juvenile court information and the property owner’s bill of rights. Postage of any other document online is voluntary, as is having a county Web site.

The existing online posting requirements are already burdensome on rural local governments, where there is no information technology staff or outward demand from taxpayers to spend their dollars posting documents online. The requirements have led several rural counties to disband or forgo having a Web site, since county staff and resources are too small to update Web sites frequently. In Atascosa County, which has a population of roughly 41,000, County Auditor Staci Jones said that the county does not to have a Web site because it would require the county to create a new highpay grade position — the county currently does not have any information technology staff — among other expenditures.

“I don’t have any (taxpayer) asking me to create a county Web site,” Jones said, adding that the county’s taxpayers keep officials accountable via good old-fashioned in-person interaction. “If someone is interested, they can come over here and get the information they want. Why should we have to pay all this extra money to have it available online if only three people want to look at it?”

The Texas Association of Counties, through its County Information Resources Agency (CIRA), does provide some aid to other rural and mid-sized counties who want a Web site but lack resources such as a Web site developer. CIRA provides counties with free Web site hosting and a basic content management system that allows county officials to post simple documents and agendas online, and also provides some support services.

“The majority of counties do not have a technology department or staff members, so posting will fall to a county employee who already has a full plate of responsibilities, no matter how free or easy we make it,” said CIRA Director Gayle Latham.

According to the Check Up, as of Feb. 23, approximately 138 counties have their annual budgets posted online, while 68 offer financial reports online and seven counties — Collin, El Paso, Grayson, Guadalupe, Harris, Smith and Tarrant — post their check registers online in some format. However, the Check Up doesn’t promise to be accurate, and it’s up to county officials or staff to make sure the Check Up is providing accurate information.

Paxton said he wants to work with counties to make online financial transparency more cost-effective. After hearing from several local official associations, he began engaging in conversations with the Comptroller’s Office about whether it’s possible the state can help provide any resources to counties.

“I have heard concerns from counties that the implementation of this bill would create an unfunded mandate,” he said. “As a result I am currently negotiating with the Comptroller’s Office to determine if they would be able to provide the software and some IT support to create a template for counties to use. Having access to a template, support and software will relieve the financial burden on counties, and having a consistent template and format will make searching for information easier for the public.”

Just how much time and energy would be needed to develop such a template or database also depends on the rules imposed via the bill — how immediately information much be available online, what level of information must be viewable online.

But regardless of the rules, creating a template would be a complicated procedure, and it’s most likely several or many templates will be necessary. That’s because each county has its own Chart of Accounts, a different map of its financial expenditures. The Comptroller’s Office would have to first acquire each county’s Chart of Accounts and then create a template that incorporates the differences and similarities between the 254 documents. Counties would then have to determine where each line item in their financial system should be entered in the provided template.

“Given the disparity in financial systems and the varying Chart of Accounts in use across the state, there is absolutely no way that a single template would be useful for all or even a majority of counties in the (population) bracket unless the individual counties spend a good deal of money and time making it useful,” said Tim Brown, the senior analyst for TAC’s County Information Project, which collects yearly financial data from counties.

“Think of it as one of those matching questions on a high school test where you have two columns of text and have to draw a line from column A to its matching item in column B. Only instead of five or six items in each column, there are thousands, or even tens of thousands, of items in each column,” he said, adding that the need to redact private information adds another layer of difficulty to the template’s development.

Even if a template is created, using it may require a significant use of county official time and taxpayer money, since the template must still be filled with county information somehow. Some counties may be able to purchase a software program to do it, while others will have to enter the data manually.

“Many counties will not have the technical skills or will not be able to come up with the front money to hire someone to do it for them, and some will be using proprietary systems or have contracts that do not allow the county to pull data from their own systems,” Brown said. “So automatically populating the template with data will be easy for some, virtually impossible for others, and expensive for almost everyone."