Transparency dogged the TNInvestco program from the beginning, including with a lawsuit demanding to know how the recipients were chosen. Lawmakers also, when creating the program, enacted statutes to keep confidential the specific results of the state's investments.
Taxpayers don't know what they are getting for their money despite some lawmakers pushing for more accountability and information. Why? A web of exceptions to Tennessee's Public Records laws and lack of meaningful reporting on outcomes prevent transparency in the state's economic development programs.
The proposed bill that would create the Megasite Authority of West Tennessee with the power to approve a half-billion dollar grant to Ford Motor Co. offers another coveted power: megasecrecy.
A proposed public records exemption would make confidential "all proprietary information" received by the state from its health insurance contractors, including but not limited to information or data about reimbursement rates paid through the state's self-funded employee health plan. Access to information showing the disparities in payments to health care providers for the same services became an issue in 2019 when then-state Rep. Martin Daniel of Knoxville sought to get data to see if the state was reaping savings it should. After Daniel sought the information, the three large health care companies who contract with the state to administer the state’s employee health care plan — BlueCross Blue Shield of [...]
Today is a bill filing deadline in Tennessee, so this list will be updated and most certainly will get bigger as we learn more. The larger issue for TCOG will be caption bills, which open up parts of the Tennessee Code that are not part of the Public Records Act in Title 10, Chapter 7, and are not yet clear that they aim to close records. We hope to find out about these bills early in the process so that we can examine the language more closely. If you know of something, please let us know! We are happy to examine and vet legislation, and share our insight on how [...]