It’s been one year since the Comptroller General unveiled South Carolina’s first spending transparency website that allows people to see what the government is doing with their money, and he says it’s proven to be successful.
Comptroller General Richard Eckstrom says people should know where their money is going, so on March 4th of last year he launched a new website, www.cg.sc.gov . In its first year, as many as 10,000 visitors per month checked out the site. Eckstrom says he wants to continue efforts to raise awareness on a local level to increase that number even more.
“It’s public money. It’s not the government’s money and as long as we hold the view that the money belongs to the public, to the citizens of the state and not the government, no one should have any objection at all in disclosing how that money’s being spent, where that money’s being spent, why that money’s being spent. And, so we’re going to continue to work with local governments,” says Eckstrom.
On the site, more than 80 agencies list their spending details. Eckstrom says citizens have a right to know what state agencies are spending their money on and at the same time he wants local governments to see how cost efficient the process is to post the spending information. Right now, the State Senate is reviewing three bills and the House, one, to require local governments to post spending information, but Eckstrom says there would not have to be a bill if these local governments would freely use his website.