Obama Holds Stimulus Accountability Summit With State Leaders

As money from the $787 billion stimulus begins to roll out, President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden are meeting with state officials today to talk about how to address one of the bill's biggest challenges—ensuring that the federal funds will be spent responsibly.

From the first debates over the stimulus bill, the White House has promised "unprecedented" levels of transparency and accountability. The bill allotted about $350 million in oversight measures, including $84 million for the creation of an oversight board headed by former Interior Department Inspector General Earl Devaney, who helped uncover the Jack Abramoff scandal. But the states, which are receiving roughly $200 billion of stimulus funds for their various programs, will play a key role in ensuring that the administration's pledge is fulfilled.

"States have a huge responsibility in partnering with us to ensure that dollars spent as part of the Recovery Act are spent wisely, with transparency and accountability," Biden said in a statement. "Our hope for this conference is to meet face to face with the state officials and streamline this implementation process so we can get our economy running again."

The challenge for the states, as for agencies and entities nationwide, is how to get the money out both quickly and effectively. That's made particularly difficult for the number of state agencies that find themselves both understaffed and inexperienced at dealing with such large infusions of cash. In some cases, the allocated funds are worth many times agencies' annual budgets.

Another challenge, experts say, is the bill's wide variety of funding streams. With money coming into the states for a range of purposes and through a number of routes, ranging from $87 billion for Medicaid to $12 billion to educate students with special needs, the complexities—and the obstacles to effective oversight—are huge. "It definitely means that the people overseeing the project have to be even more vigilant and have to do even more homework," says Matt Boxer, New Jersey's state comptroller. Boxer is leading his state's oversight board of stimulus spending.

To address those issues, each state has been invited to send a senior official working on the bill's implementation to today's conference. The White House has said the purpose of the meeting is to underscore the necessity of spending the money correctly and to share ideas about how to do so. But states are looking forward to getting other questions answered, too. Jack Lavin, who, as Illinois's chief operating officer, is overseeing his state's stimulus funds, says he particularly wants to ask about specific program guidelines and how states can compete for various grants.

The conference, which runs all day today, will involve Devaney and other administration.

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