Publish What You Fund has joined a coalition of organisations and over 2000 individuals in urging Congress leaders to protect US government spending on transparency programs.

The letter, sent by the Sunlight Foundation, expresses “concerns over proposed budget reductions that would effectively eliminate important government transparency programs”. The danger is that new transparency sites such as Data.gov, USASpending.gov, and the IT Dashboard would see their current funding pool reduced from $34 million to $2 million.

In a tight fiscal environment it is particularly important that transparency initiatives are protected so we can see exactly where money is being spent, and make informed decisions about where the budget can be cut, and where it can be protected. As the letter states, “Fully realized transparency would allow us to track every expense and truly understand how money like that in the electronic government fund flows to federal programs.” Without that transparency, cuts will effectively be made in the dark.

Read the letter here.