WASHINGTON - July 14 - Last week, the Obama administration ended the period for public comment on its "Open Government Initiative," which sought independent ideas from the public about methods the administration could employ to increase overall government transparency, public participation, and public collaboration. At the end of this unique program, a recommendation suggesting the institution of strong whistleblower protections for federal employees blew away the competition, receiving twice as many endorsements as any other idea put forth by the public during the program - a total amount of 304 different ideas, divided among 16 categories.

"Federal employee whistleblower protections simply dominated this program as the public's chief demand involving open government - there's no other way to view these results," stated Tom Devine, Legal Director of the Government Accountability Project (GAP). 

The program was part of an effort to implement President Obama's Transparency Memorandum, which summoned "an unprecedented level of openness in government." Click here to read about the results in more detail: http://www.mixedink.com/OpenGov/

This initiative is but another vehicle that has voiced public demand for honest federal whistleblower protections - specifically by endorsing H.R. 1507, the House Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act of 2009, which extends full whistleblower coverage to the federal workforce, including national security employees.

Shanna Devine, GAP Legislative Campaign Coordinator, commented further: "The jury is out - the public understands that any transparency initiative is window dressing until federal employees are empowered to disclose threats that betray the public trust through full court access, enforced by a jury trial, in the event of retaliation."

The directive was comprised of three phases (Brainstorm, Discuss, Draft) intended to build upon one another to produce a collaborative set of open government policy recommendations. Each phase was divided into three principles - Transparency, Participation, Collaboration - which were then broken into subcategories to contribute under.

For more information about how the online process worked, please contact GAP Legislative Campaign Coordinator Shanna Devine at 202.457.0034, ext. 132, or shannad@whistleblower.org.