Wednesday, 9 December 2009, 3:53 pm Press Release: The White House
Administration Launches Comprehensive Open
Government Plan
Public Provides Thousands
of Ideas to Spark New Administration
Initiatives
WASHINGTON, D.C. –
As part of the Obama Administration’s work to change how
Washington does business, the White House Tuesday issued the
Open Government Directive requiring
federal agencies to take immediate, specific steps to open
their operations up to the public. The Administration also
released an Open Government Progress Report to the
American People and previewed a number of other openness
commitments that are poised to be released during the next
two days. The directive, released by the Office of
Management and Budget, sets an unprecedented standard for
government agencies, insisting that they achieve key
milestones in transparency, collaboration, and
participation. “The President has been clear from day
one in office: the federal government must break down the
barriers between it and the people it’s supposed to serve.
Today’s announcement will help to make government more
open, transparent, and accountable to bridge the gap between
the American people and their government,” White House
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Peter R.
Orszag said. OMB, at the President’s direction,
released the Open Government Directive that requires
agencies to take immediate, specific steps to open their
operations to the public. The White House unveiled the directive on a live webchat
hosted by federal Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra and
federal Chief Information Officer Vivek Kundra. The
directive stems largely from the unprecedented Open
Government Initiative, coordinated by the White House
Office of Science and Technology Policy during the summer,
in which the Administration reached out directly to the
American people for specific policy recommendations.
Thousands of citizens participated in the online forums and
offered ideas on how to transform the government into a more
transparent, accountable, participatory operation. In
addition to the directive, the Administration on Tuesday
released the Open Government Progress Report to the American
People – an analysis of the steps already taken to
increase transparency and a look at the actions on the
horizon. Every Cabinet department is launching new
open-government projects that will spark significant
expansion in public accountability and access. Details on
those projects will be released tomorrow. “The American
people know best what their government should do for them.
It’s fitting that our open government directive has been
significantly shaped by the collective wisdom of the
American people,” Orszag said. The Open Government
Directive, called for by President Obama on his first full
day in office, puts accountability and accessibility at the
center of how the federal government operates. It instructs
agencies to share information with the public through
online, open, accessible, machine-readable formats.
Agencies are to inventory existing information and establish
a timeline for publishing them online to increase agency
accountability and responsiveness; improve public knowledge
of the agency and its operations; further the core mission
of the agency; create economic opportunity; or respond to
need and demand as identified through public consultation.
The directive also requires that annual Freedom of
Information Act (FOIA) reports be published online in
machine-readable formats, and demanding milestones for
improving data quality and records management. Second, it
aims to instill the values of transparency, participation,
and collaboration into the culture of every agency by
requiring every agency to formulate an Open Government Plan
and website. Specifically, each agency will be required to
develop its own, unique roadmap in consultation with the
American people and open government experts, rather than
prescribing a one-size-fits-all approach. Once again, these
ideas came directly from the public’s suggestions. To
assist agencies in the process of creating a plan, the White
House will establish a forum and online dashboard to share
best practices and track progress on transparency,
participation, and collaboration, including how to take
advantage of the expertise and insight of people both inside
and outside the federal government. Moving forward, OMB,
in consultation with the Chief Technology Officer and the
Chief Information Officer, will review government-wide
information policies, such as the Paperwork Reduction Act
and the federal cookies policy that may need updating or
clarifying to allow agencies to utilize new technologies
that promote open government fully.
