Senate Democrats today adopted the House Republicans’ new transparency requirements for earmarks as part of ongoing budget negotiations at the state Capitol. House Republicans passed these rules in January and refused to add earmarks to the state budget until the state Senate lived up to the same standard of transparency and accountability.

House Republicans led the way to reform with House Resolution 14, which required that every spending item requested by legislators be publicly vetted with a real justification and be listed on a public website ahead of the vote. The plan also banned earmarks for for-profit businesses, increased standards for non-profit recipients and protected taxpayers from conflicts of interest. The competing Senate proposal would have simply listed the names of grant recipients on a website a year after a vote, preventing any accountability until votes were long since cast. Today, Senate Democrats changed direction and adopted the House Republican rules.

“The Hall Ethics Accountability and Transparency (HEAT) Plan is the most significant transparency and ethics reform in years,” said Speaker of the House Matt Hall. “It’s no surprise to see it catching on at the Capitol. We are making real progress on budget and spending reforms during this negotiation, and this is the latest win. We already have agreements to cut waste, fraud and abuse, limit the size of state government, eliminate phantom employees hidden in department line items now reform the state’s broken earmark process. This is how we can fund our real priorities and stop the mismanagement and corruption that followed these funds for years.”

As part of the agreement, Senate Democrats have also committed to make a permanent change in state law to reflect the new rules. House Republicans have already passed a bill that would do just that. The House and Senate resolutions lock in transparency this year, but the permanent law change will guarantee a better process for years to come.

“This is how we get better value for the taxpayers,” Hall said. “Far too many of these earmarks have been abused by bad actors in the past, and far too many politicians have abused this process to stuff the budget full of pork projects they can’t defend. That ends now. We are rooting out that bad spending and bringing the HEAT to Lansing.”