How cool is that? Exposing Earmarks!

The Sunlight Foundation has an absolutely outstanding contribution to porkbusting. They call it their Exposing Earmarks project dedicated to detailing the over 1,800 earmarks in the upcoming Labor HHS bill (details of the earmarks can be found in the House Report 109-515).

What makes this effort unique is the integration of a Google Map search to give you a geographical view of all the earmarks...very innovative. (They even provide step-by-step instructions on how the map was created with the Google API!) Partner this with the spreadsheet detailing all the earmarks and you have one heck of a research tool.

Using the spreadsheet and two clicks of the mouse shows that Ohio has:

• 135 Earmarks
• Total of all Ohio earmarks: $33,645,000
• Largest earmark: $1,750,000 for the Columbus Children's Research Institute, for facilities and equipment
• The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra getting $300,000 for the Sound Discoveries Program for K-12 students
• The Taft Museum of Art getting $200,000 for exhibitions and outreach
• The Toledo Jazz Society getting $100,000 for music education initiatives for youth and teachers
• The Cleveland Institute of Art getting $50,000 for expansion of programs
• The Camp Fire USA Northeast Ohio Council getting $50,000 for the Young Leaders Serving Ohio program
• Miami University getting $30,000 for digitization
• And much, much more

Check it out!

HT: Captain's Quarters