By Caleb Taylor Faulkner County is the latest Arkansas county to follow ACRE recommendations to increase their transparency and public accessibility. ACRE Policy Analyst Dr. Mavuto Kalulu discussed his research on the benefits of transparency at a Faulkner County Quorum Court meeting on August 20th. Faulkner County Justices of the Peace were deciding whether to […]
How To Reduce Corruption in Arkansas
By Caleb Taylor How can Arkansas reduce government corruption? ACRE Policy Analyst Dr. Mavuto Kalulu discussed solutions to this question and four steps officials can take to improve transparency in an op-ed published in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette on August 5th. Kalulu begins by noting the size and scope of corruption at all levels of government […]
How Can County Officials Improve Transparency?
By Caleb Taylor How can Faulkner County officials improve transparency? ACRE Policy Analyst Mavuto Kalulu discussed solutions to this question and steps officials have already taken in an op-ed published in the Log Cabin Democrat on April 16. Kalulu mentioned Faulkner County Circuit Clerk Crystal Taylor (no relation to the author) as an example of […]
Measuring Public Resource Abuse in Arkansas
By Mavuto Kalulu Public corruption exists at all levels of government. The impact of the abuse of public services may be strongly felt at the local government level because of the direct contact these government officials have in the provision of services. In Arkansas, for example, county governments are responsible for emergency medical services, fire […]
Momentum for Transparency Grows in Arkansas
By Caleb Taylor ACRE Policy Analyst Mavuto Kalulu recently praised two new steps toward transparency for Arkansas’s county governments: Faulkner County Circuit Clerk Crystal Taylor’s [no relation] work on transparency, and legislative efforts to require counties to publish their budgets online. In an article published in the Log Cabin Democrat on March 6th entitled “Circuit […]
Time for Greater Transparency in Arkansas Counties: Let the Sun Shine In
By Mavuto Kalulu Transparency is one of the most powerful weapons against government corruption, but counties don’t make it easy for Arkansans to access their public financial information. Only 8 out of Arkansas’s 75 counties have their 2017 budget online. Corruption is a significant problem in Arkansas. Legislative audits detected nearly $40 million in public […]
We asked all 75 counties for their budgets. Here’s what we found.
By Caleb Taylor How difficult is it to get a copy of a county budget in Arkansas? According to ACRE research published in an op-ed the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette on February 15th, that depends on which of the 75 Arkansas counties you ask. Alexandria Tatem, a UCA Schedler Honor’s College student and an ACRE student worker […]
Washington County Makes Transparency a Priority
By Mavuto Kalulu and Terra Aquia Congratulations to Washington County government officials for the good work on publishing public information on their website. According to the transparency index created by the Arkansas Center for Research in Economics (ACRE), not only did Washington County obtain the highest overall score, it led in each of the three […]
Why should counties improve their transparency?
By Caleb Taylor What can county governments do to improve transparency? ACRE Policy Analyst Mavuto Kalulu and Program Coordinator Terra Aquia discussed this and more with Paul Harrell on the Conduit News radio program on September 26th. Kalulu and Aquia along with Joyce Ajayi, a candidate in the Interdisciplinary PhD in Leadership Studies program at […]
Let the Sunshine In: County Leaders Hear How to Improve Government Transparency
By Caleb Taylor How can Arkansas counties improve their online transparency? Arkansas Center for Research in Economics (ACRE) Policy Analyst Mavuto Kalulu and ACRE Program Coordinator Terra Aquia discussed this and the findings of a new Transparency Index at the County Judges 2018 Fall meeting on September 14th in North Little Rock. County Judges are […]