Utah gets B+ for transparency, but can still do better

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The U.S. Public Interest Research Group Education Fund ranked Utah ninth in the nation for transparency on financial matters.

The group gave Utah a grade of B+ for its transparency website. It noted that Utah's site provides "checkbook" level information on what government entities are spending, and cited how the data encouraged the state to cut back on buying bottled water to save money.

The state did receive some low marks for not having searchable and downloadable formats for economic-development tax credits, or information to hold the companies receiving the tax breaks accountable.