Oakland County Clerk Bill Bullard Jr. Announces “Open Oakland” Transparency Project Now Online

Today Oakland County Clerk Bill Bullard Jr. announced a milestone in transparency in County Government by posting the minutes of all meetings of the Oakland County Board of Commissioners online—back to its founding in 1970—along with many other official documents.
The records are not merely chronological scanned copies of the minutes; they are also searchable by keyword, making the process more open than ever before.  While the minutes have always been public record, to this point searching through them required someone to come to the County Courthouse and physically search through the paper records which were stored in boxes.
“People should be able to find out what their government has been up to, and how and why we arrived at the decisions that affect their lives,” said Bullard.  “With today’s technology, there is no reason why that should be a painstaking or laborious task for them to go through.  It doesn’t do a lot of good to pass so-called `sunshine laws’ if the information is all buried somewhere where most people cannot easily get to it, much less research it.”
Bullard pointed out that this is another logical extension of his “Online, Not In Line” campaign to make it as easy as possible for Oakland County Citizens, and others with interest, to access the Clerk and Register of Deeds records and services as conveniently as possible.
The Open Oakland archives can be accessed by going to www.oakgov.com/clerkrod and clicking on the green Open Oakland button.
Besides Board of Commissioners meeting minutes, the Open Oakland site also contains agendas, resolutions, County Ordinances, Interlocal Agreements between the county and various municipalities, and copies of each official election canvass.  Also, there are complete minutes of the caucus meetings of the majority party beginning in 2008 after it was determined that was covered by the Open Meetings Act.
Open Oakland is the first project of its kind in the state of Michigan to cover such a wide range of official documents.

About Tom and Ann Gendich

Founders of Rochester Media. Looking to provide great local news to all people in and around Rochester and Rochester Hills. Send them a note at info@rochestermedia.com.

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