BILL REQ. #:  H-4007.1 

READ FIRST TIME 02/05/14.   

     AN ACT Relating to increasing transparency in higher education by requiring certain departmental budget detail to be available online; adding a new section to chapter 28B.10 RCW; and creating a new section.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION.  Sec. 1   The legislature finds that transparency in higher education budgeting is essential to the maintenance of public trust in the higher education system. Such transparency is not only an appropriate check on future higher education cost increases, it should also counteract any perception that public institutions are not adequately accountable for student and taxpayer dollars. Therefore, to ensure general accessibility to meaningful budget information and to improve public confidence in the system, the legislature intends to require that departmental budgets of institutions of higher education be posted on the education data center's data dashboard.
     The legislature finds that placing the responsibility for posting departmental budgets of institutions of higher education on the education data center takes advantage of the independence, expertise, and technology base within the education data center. The legislature intends that the education data center use information that is already public, so as to minimize the costs to the education data center.

NEW SECTION.  Sec. 2   A new section is added to chapter 28B.10 RCW to read as follows:
     The education data center established in RCW 43.41.400 shall post on the education data center's data dashboard established under RCW 28B.77.090 the department-level budgets, including budget planning and expenditures of institutions of higher education. For institutions of higher education without a department structure, the education data center shall post comparable budget information. The education data center shall post department-level budget plans and budget expenditures to the data dashboard within sixty days of an institution of higher education's adoption of its annual fiscal budget plan and completion of its fiscal year budget. The education data center is responsible for obtaining the budget and spending data from each institution of higher education, and for developing the format used to display the budget information.