The Office of Government Ethics has recommended
streamlining the financial disclosure rules applying to
certain higher-level federal employees, in response to
an order in last year’s intelligence reform bill to study
those issues.
OGE in its report said that while the goals of financial
reporting remain valid, “we have concluded that the current
public financial disclosure system requires reporting more
information than is useful or necessary to achieve its
fundamental goals of preventing conflicts of interest and
maintaining the public’s confidence in government. It is
not the general subject of the information requested, but
rather the level of detail required, that is burdensome and
overly intrusive. Such unnecessary detail could be eliminated
without reducing compliance with applicable conflict of
interest requirements and without harming the public
interest in disclosure.”
Specifically, it recommended that Congress: limit the scope
of reporting by raising certain dollar thresholds; reduce
the number of valuation categories; reduce the covered
reporting periods for disclosing outside positions held and
sources of compensation received; and reduce descriptive
details that it said are unnecessary for conflicts analysis.
it also recommended a number of technical changes.