Midwest legislators fail to provide public information on personal financial disclosures

CHICAGO — Three of the five Midwest Democracy Network states flunk a 50-state ranking of personal financial disclosure laws for state legislators. Illinois and Minnesota receive failing grades, while Michigan ties for last place because the state lacks a legislative personal financial disclosure law.

The remaining two Network states — Wisconsin and Ohio — pass, but not with flying colors, receiving grades of C and D respectively.

Legislators in 21 states must provide more details on their personal financial holdings than legislators in the Midwest Democracy Network’s five-state region of Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin.

All five states see their national rank go down in the survey, published online by the Center for Public Integrity, a national, nonprofit, nonpartisan, independent digital news organization. Meanwhile, the project reveals that 14 other states have improved their disclosure laws since the previous survey in 2006.

Two Southern states — Louisiana and Mississippi — made the biggest strides in the survey.

The rankings are illustrated by an interactive color-coded map that provides a nationwide comparison of state disclosure standards for lawmakers.

Rankings are based on a 43-question survey that measures public access to information on legislators’ employment, investments, personal finances, property holdings or other activities outside the legislature. This is the Center for Public Integrity’s third survey ranking the strength of legislative personal financial disclosure laws since 1999.

Survey answers are assigned a numerical value adding up to a possible 100 points; the highest scores reflect the highest degree of disclosure. A failing grade is defined as a score of less than 60 points on the survey.

Check out how the Midwest Democracy Network’s states stack up.

—Leah Rush