public employees

By Cowboy State Daily

A bill that would limit the amount of information provided in official notices about how much public employees are paid cleared a House committee Thursday.

HB 146 would remove the names of county and city public employees from a list that is published in the state’s newspapers.

Under current law, that list now must contain the name of each employee, their position and their salary. The bill would limit that information to positions and salaries only.

The House Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Committee approved the bill on a 5-4 vote for discussion by all members of the House.

However, the bill is opposed by “Foster’s Outriders,” a group formed by former GOP gubernatorial candidate Foster Friess to pursue various interests in government including transparency.

“We view this as an extremely anti-transparency measure and it’s designed to hide from the public the names and salary information,” said Parker Jackson, a spokesman for the group. “They’re trying to separate those two from the public.”

In the interest of disclosure, it must be noted that Foster Friess is an investor in the Cowboy State Daily.