JACKSON — For public policy wonks, the Mississippi Center for Public Policy’s new “Seethespending.org” website is going to be as addictive as the Madden 2010 video game is for football fans.
The MCPP, a non-partisan and non-profit think tank located in Jackson, has built the new searchable database that allows people who register on the site to search state spending by vendor, by agency or by category.
The site is billed by MCPP as “giving Mississippians a clear look into how Mississippi government collects and spends their hard-earned tax dollars. It is designed to be a tool used by Mississippians to research, analyze, compare and share government spending data.”
Want to know how much Mississippi government spent on drapes and carpets over the last seven and one-quarter fiscal years? The answer is $1.68 million.
Want to know how much Mississippi government spent on “food for business meetings” over the last seven and one-quarter fiscal years? The answer is $11.4 million — and that’s on top of $264.3 million for “food for persons” that includes everything from commodities for the Governor’s Mansion to feeding state prisoners, mental patients, trainees at the State Fire Academy, young people served by the Department of Human Services and others.
Because I know someone will ask, the site shows that the state in total spent over $2.4 million with the Clarion-Ledger, the newspaper for which I work, over that same seven and one-quarter year period.
How about travel? Over that same period, state government spent $1.3 million on out-of-country travel and $30.2 million on out-of-state travel.
One more? OK, how about the amount of state funds spent on tires and inner tubes for state cars, trucks, tractors and off-road vehicles over that same period? It comes to more than a cool $9.7 million.
The “Seethespending.org” website gives citizens a chance to break down spending by fiscal year, by category, and by who is benefiting from the spending.
In addition to balding reporters sitting up hacking obscure spending information on a laptop, this site will appeal to people in the political realm as well. Never has it been so easy for folks running campaigns to research public spending to such detail with such ease — and you can bet challengers for legislative seats, for statewide offices and for other political posts will use the site extensively to glean such information to the detriment of incumbents.
The political advertising narrative will run something like this: “State records reveal that Mississippi’s hard-working taxpayers paid for $31.5 million worth of new cars for state employees over the last seven fiscal years. Have you had a new car in the last seven years? Send state Rep. Billy Joe Jim Bob Jawbreaker a message on Nov. 4. Tell him you’re tired of buying new cars for bureaucrats! I’m Jacky Joe Fishcatcher and I approved this message.”
That’s certainly one use of the site. But in the broader sense, those citizens trying to get a legitimate handle on state spending and the interrelationships between legal state spending largess and campaign contributions — in conjunction with databases already available on the Secretary of State’s Election Division website — will have the tools to do it.
Soon to come will be similar information on state contracts and taxes.
When the site is completed, MCPP President Forest Thigpen says the same information available on state government will be available in searchable databases for county, municipal and school district contracts, taxing and spending as well.
Public officials, fair warning. This electronic tool may be hazardous to your political health and longevity.
