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# LA’s New Financial Website Not Quite Useless... But Almost
October 24 2013
Written by Mark Lacter.
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***LA OBSERVED***-So now we know that on Dec. 21, 2012 the city cut a check to AT&T for $1,387.83 to cover something. The day before Verizon was receiving $909.10, also for something. Oh, and the Planning Department's payroll is $22.3 million and a bunch of city employees makes more than $300,000. All this and more - so much more - is found on Control Panel LA, the latest effort at transparent city government.
"This data is not our data. It is the public's data," said Mayor Eric Garcetti in [rolling out](http://www.scpr.org/blogs/politics/2013/10/23/15048/new-website-opens-los-angeles-financial-books-to-t/) the website, which is being overseen by LA's new controller, Ron Galperin.
"The more tools we give to people to look at data, to track important measures, the more power that they will have to control the direction of their city government." Well, maybe. There's certainly nothing wrong with information - the more of it that's easy to access, the better. And to be fair, I've only done a brief scan on what's available.
But the truth is much of the information on [Control Panel LA](https://controllerdata.lacity.org/%20) can be found by prowling through the city's budget documents. That includes granular data on revenues and expenditures. ***([Read the rest … including what Lacter thinks of Garcetti’s intentions … here.](http://www.laobserved.com/biz/2013/10/las_new_financial_we.php%20%20))***
**-cw**
**CityWatch**
**Vol 11 Issue 86**
**Pub: Oct 25, 2013**
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