The group analyzed 13 different aspects of integrity for each state — including public access to information — in 240 questions.
Despite its ‘D’ ranking, North Carolina still had the 18th highest rating — the highest, Alaska, only receiving a ‘C.’
Jonathan Jones, director of the N.C. Open Government Coalition, a nonpartisan coalition for the public’s access to government activity said he supports the standards set by the report.
“I think the majority of the things they were looking for were best practices, things that would improve access to information and the ability for citizen’s to trust that their government in doing what they expect it to do,” he said.
Nicholas Kusnetz, a reporter for the Center for Public Integrity, said government distrust can often stem from perceptions of public officials as unresponsive or dishonest.
Although it was not considered in the report, a lack of transparency by the Board of Governors in dismissing current UNC-system president Tom Ross and the hiring of his successor, former Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings, is an example of what is wrong with leadership, Jones said.
“The things that are happening in the University of North Carolina system are like the canary in the coal mine — you can see what happens when an agency doesn’t do its work in a transparent way, and you can see it breeds distrust and concern among its constituents,” he said.
But Perry Newson, executive director of the State Ethics Commission of North Carolina, said confidentiality can be important, particularly when dealing with complaints and advice.
