FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 23, 2008
CONTACT: Erik Arneson
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Senator Pileggi: State Contracts Available Online 

State contracts can now be reviewed online as part of Pennsylvania's new Open Records Law, Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi (R-9) announced today. 

"This searchable contract database is the first tangible result of the new Open Records Law," Senator Pileggi said. "Making state contracts easily available online gives citizens unprecedented access to review how their tax dollars are spent." 

Senator Pileggi was the prime sponsor of Senate Bill 1, now Act 3 of 2008, which rewrote and strengthened Pennsylvania's 50-year-old Open Records Law. 

The contract database, available at PaTreasury.org, already includes more than 1,500 documents. Contracts in the database can be searched by keyword, state agency, dollar amount, date of execution, and other categories. Agencies are required to provide summaries with every contract, making it easier for the public to search for specific contracts. 

"Rewriting our outdated Open Records Law was long overdue," said Senator Pileggi. "The online contract database is an enormous step forward in the ongoing process of making state government more transparent and accessible to taxpayers." 

Since the law requiring the database, known as the PA Contracts e-Library, went into effect on July 1, an average of nearly 100 documents have been added each business day. The contract database was originally proposed in Senate Bill 914, introduced by Senator Jake Corman (R-34) and co-sponsored by Senator Pileggi.