About
Founded in January 2008, Oklahomans for Responsible Government is a non-profit taxpayer advocacy organization based in Oklahoma City. Our mission is to increase transparency in all levels of government across the state. We do research to find out how well government entities provide information to citizens, educate taxpayers on how they can track spending at all levels of government and identify ways for government to use technology to become more open.
OFRG works to identify issues in all forms of government: school board, city council, county government, and state legislature.
Accomplishments
- Became state leader in government transparency through the creation of the Blueprint for Transparency series starting with a look at public school district websites
- Initiated the idea for Open Books 2.0 which provides data on state spending that can be downloaded and sorted by the public, providing a far greater level of transparency
- Advocated for more information on school spending through the School District Transparency Act and a bill that gives the State Auditor’s Office oversight of the annual audits of school districts
- Testified at interim studies on transparency and other policy issues
- Tracking stimulus dollars coming into Oklahoma, making sure they are not used for ongoing spending that will have to be back-filled by state dollars in the future
Current Projects
- Updating the Blueprint for Transparency review of school district websites in Oklahoma to see what information is being provided to taxpayers
- Building the grassroots effort to defeat State Question 744 through the development of the www.STOP744.com website and public presentations on the topic throughout the state
OFRG Principles
- Improving transparency in government
- Eliminating wasteful spending and unnecessary government programs
- Promoting fiscal responsibility and priority-setting in government spending
- Improving access to public records
- Exposing government abuse and corruption