Chapter 172
2006 -- H 6779
SUBSTITUTE A
Enacted 06/23/06
A N A C T
RELATING
TO PUBLIC PROPERTY AND WORKS --
GOVERNMENT
OVERSIGHT AND FISCAL ACCOUNTABILITY REVIEW ACT
Introduced
By: Representatives Corvese, Schadone, Moura, Lewiss, and San Bento
Date
Introduced: January 11, 2006
It is enacted by the General Assembly as
follows:
SECTION 1. Title
37 of the General Laws entitled "Public Property and Works" is
hereby amended by adding thereto the following
chapter:
CHAPTER
2.3
GOVERNMENT OVERSIGHT AND
FISCAL ACCOUNTABILITY REVIEW ACT
37-2.3-1.
Short title. – This chapter shall be known and may be cited as the
"Government Oversight and Fiscal
Accountability Review Act."
37-2.3-2.
Legislative intent. – The legislature finds and declares that using
private
contractors to provide public services normally
provided by public employees does not always
promote the public interest. To ensure that citizens
of this state receive high quality public
services at low costs, with due regard for the
taxpayers of this state, and the service recipients,
the legislature finds it necessary to ensure
that access to public information guaranteed by the
access to public records act is not in any way
hindered by the fact that public services are
provided by private contractors.
37-2.3-3.
Definitions. – As used in this chapter, the following terms shall
have the
following meanings:
(1)
"Agency" includes any executive office, department, division, board,
commission, or
other office or officer in the executive branch
of the government.
(2)
"Private contractor employee" includes a worker directly employed by
a private
contractor, as defined in this section, as well
as an employee of a subcontractor or an independent
contractor that provides supplies or services to
a private contractor.
(3)
"Services" includes, with respect to a private contractor, all
aspects of the provision of
services provided by a private contractor
pursuant to a privatization contract, or any services
provided by a subcontractor of a private
contractor.
(4)
"Person" includes an individual, institution, federal, state, or
local governmental
entity, or any other public or private entity.
(5)
"Privatization contract" is an agreement or combination or series of
agreements by
which a nongovernmental person or entity agrees
with an agency to provide services, valued at
one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000) or more,
which are substantially similar to and in lieu
of, services heretofore provided, in whole or in
part, by regular employees of an agency.
(6)
"Privatization contractor" is any contractor, consultant,
subcontractor, independent
contractor or private business owner that
contracts with a state agency to perform services which
are substantially similar to and in lieu of
services heretofore provided, in whole or in part, by
employees of an agency.
37-2.3-4. Fiscal
monitoring of privatization contracts. – Each private contractor
shall
file a copy of each executed subcontract or
amendment to the subcontract with the agency, which
shall maintain the subcontract or amendment as a
public record, as defined in the access to public
records act.
(1) Audits.
Privatization contracts shall be subject to audit or review, as defined by the
American Institute of Certified Public
Accountants, by the office of the auditor general at the
discretion of the auditor general. Any audit or
review shall be conducted in compliance with
generally accepted auditing standards.
(2) Access. All
privatization contracts shall include a contract provision specifying
language that provides public access to the
complete contract.
(3) Fiscal
accountability. As part of the budgetary process, each state agency shall
provide an addendum to their submitted budget
request listing all privatization contracts; the
name of each contractor, subcontractor, duration
of the contract provided and services provided;
the total cost of each contract(s) for the prior
year; and the projected number of privatization
service contracts for the current and upcoming
year, the total cost of each contract(s) for the prior
year; the estimated costs of each contract(s)
for the current and upcoming year. The addendum
for each agency shall also contain a summary of
contracted private contractor employees for each
contract, reflected as full-time equivalent
positions, their hourly wage rate, and the number of
private contractor employees and consultants for
the current and previous fiscal year. The
addendums shall be open records.
SECTION 2. Section
42-90-1 of the General Laws in Chapter 42-90 entitled "Disclosure
of Names of State Government Consultants"
is hereby amended to read as follows:
42-90-1.
Public disclosure required. -- (a) All departments, commissions,
boards,
councils, and other agencies in the government
of the state shall prepare and submit to the
secretary of state quarterly a list containing:
(1) The name of
any person who performed legal, medical, accounting, engineering, or
any other professional, technical or consultant
service to the department, commission, board,
council, or agency on a contractual basis during
the previous quarter; and
(2) The amount of
compensation received by each consultant during the previous
quarter.
(b) All
departments, commissions, boards, councils and other agencies in the government
of the state shall prepare and submit to the
secretary of state on an annual basis a contracting
report containing:
(1) copies of
all contracts or agreements by which a nongovernmental person or entity
agrees with the department, commission board,
council or agency to provide services, valued at
one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000) or more,
which are substantially similar to and in lieu of
services heretofore provided, in whole or in
part, by regular employees of the department,
commission, board, council or agency; and
(2) a budget
analysis of each contract reported pursuant to subsection 42-90-1(b)
containing the cost of each contract for the
prior, current and next year; and the number of private
contractor employees reflected as full-time
equivalent positions with their hourly wage rate, and
costs of benefits for each job classification
for the current and previous year.
(b) (c)
The secretary of state shall compile, publish, and make available for public
inspection all lists and contracting reports
prepared in accordance with this chapter.
SECTION 3. This
act shall take effect upon passage.
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LC00292/SUB
A
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