Branstad proposes expanded government accountability

DES MOINES - Gov. Terry Branstad on Thursday proposed creating a Government Accountability Portal to make state government more open, transparent and accountable to Iowa citizens.

Branstad said the new entity would be a 'one-stop shop” housed within the Iowa Public Information Board for Iowans to register comments, concerns, questions or suggestions regarding state government and its operations.

The new approach would require a response to an 'input” from Iowa citizens within 24 hours and would require acknowledgment from the appropriate state agency within 48 hours, so that the citizen knows with whom the discussion will continue, according to a news release from the Branstad-Reynolds campaign.

Branstad said he and Lt. Gov. Kim Reynolds have made transparency a hallmark of their administration, beginning with the resumption of weekly news conference to directly respond to questions from the media and naming former Iowa Newspaper Association executive Bill Monroe as the state's first transparency adviser to the governor.

'Terry Branstad has zero credibility on the issue of government openness and his proposal is laughable,” said Sen. Jack Hatch, a Des Moines Democrat who is challenging Branstad in the Nov. 4 general election and has made openness a key focus of the campaign.

'Iowa wouldn't need a new transparency law if there hadn't been a complete breakdown in government openness over the past four years,” he added. 'As to the substance of the proposal, it's a failure in that all the requests for information come back to the governor and people who work for him. That leaves him in control of every piece of information that gets out. This campaign proposal may sugarcoat his failures as governor, but it does nothing to extend transparency.”

If elected, Hatch said he envisions having a fully independent state public information citizen board created by state with a budget separated from the executive branch so it would be insulated from tampering and empowered to subpoena documents, witnesses and testimony if need be with the option to release all state government information, including contents of legislative emails.

Branstad, who has deflected criticism from Democrats as partisan bickering, previously signed an executive order that prohibits confidential employee settlements and favors requiring public disclosure of the reasons for a state employee's termination.