Bailout Transparency Bill Advances
A bill aimed at shedding sunlight on bailout spending <a href="http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20091117_2830.php">finally passed</a> the House this week and now goes to the Senate, where <a href="http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20090917_7212.php">IT vendors</a>, <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:SN00910:@@@P">several Republicans</a> and the <a href="http://www.cdt.org/blogs/heather-west/tarp-transparency-moves-senate">Center for Democracy and Technology</a>, a civil liberties group, are cheering it on.
A bill aimed at shedding sunlight on bailout spending finally passed the House this week and now goes to the Senate, where IT vendors, a few Republicans and the Center for Democracy and Technology, a civil liberties group, are cheering it on.
A similar Senate measure has been pending before the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs since the spring.
The bipartisan House-passed bill, H.R. 1242, would create a database in the Treasury Department to feed lawmakers and federal auditors near real-time updates on the distribution of bailout funds. The updates on the Troubled Asset Relief Program would include company news releases, financial reports, and other public and private sources of information.
Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., introduced the bill in March and Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., sponsored the Senate version, S. 910, in April.
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