In Pa., the Senate is transparent about per diems. Why doesn't the House follow suit?

Pennsylvania lawmakers have a mixed record when it comes to transparency.

Monthly expenses for members of the state Senate are regularly posted on the upper chamber's website as PDF files for easy public access. But some senators feel this practice is susceptible to repeal because it's not codified by law or a formal resolution.

The situation is more opaque in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, where mileage and per diem reports are only posted if individual lawmakers choose to make their expenses readily available.

"Any time an agency can proivide proactive public access it saves time for the requesters and it also saves resources," said Melissa Melewsky, media law counsel for the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association. "It's a win-win."

What is a per diem?

In Pennsylvania, legislators are eligible for per diem pay, which is essentially reimbursement for their job-related travel.

Some lawmakers refuse to accept these taxpayer funds. Others have drawn criticism for racking up these kinds of expenses. State Rep. Pat Harkins (D-Erie), for example, recently acknowledged that the $154,687 he's been paid for mileage since 2018 may be excessive.

More: Pa. state Rep. Harkins to curtail travel after report of $154,000 in mileage reimbursements

In July 2021, then-Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman and other GOP leaders made it mandatory for the chief clerk to make all senators' expense information readily available to the public.

"I think it's something that, at least in the Senate, everyone was supportive of and felt that we should do," said Corman, who left public office for a lobbying job at the end of 2022. "There was no pushback at all."

"By putting them online and being public about it, it puts a check on legislators."

The goal, according to Corman, was to improve lawmakers' accountability to taxpayers. He believes it's an easy way to help prevent abuse of the system.

"I think you're far less likely to have a case where someone runs up a significant amount of per diems or a significant amount of mileage if they know people are looking at them," Corman said.

'There are some limitations to it'

Others want to solidify the current practice. State Sen. Lindsey Williams (D-Allegheny) drafted a resolution and a bill, later co-sponsored by several Democratic colleagues and state Sen. Kristin Phillips-Hill (R-York), that would've done just that.

"What the Senate is doing right now is nice, but there are some limitations to it," Williams told the USA TODAY Network.

When Williams first took office several years ago, she learned that the clerk's office had slow-walked and redacted some public information requests about her expenses. She said she found this unacceptable, and has since posted her expenses monthly to her website.

"We should all want all of this stuff to be seen and easily accessible for people," Williams said.

Senate Bill 275 represents her attempt to make this the reality for both the Senate and House. It has yet to move from the Rules and Executive Nominations Committee.

Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman, who chairs this committee, did not respond to a USA TODAY Network inquiry about his stance on the bill.

Nicole Reigelman, the press secretary for Speaker of the House Joanna McClinton, acknowledged that there's no centralized source for the public to review monthly expenses for members of the lower chamber. She noted that individual members post them to their websites on their own.

Reigelman did not respond to questions about whether McClinton would push for a more transparent system such as the one used in the Senate.

'People have a right'

Eugene DePasquale, a former state representative and auditor general who is currently seeking the Democratic nomination for attorney general, once launched an effort to have all lawmakers' expenses posted online. He said it came on the heels of a legislative pay raise that generated backlash from taxpayers, and that he thought it would help restore public confidence.

"My joke is is that I united 202 members of the Legislature against me and 12 million Pennsylvanians for me," DePasquale said.

Though he's no longer a lawmaker, DePasquale said he still hopes officials in Harrisburg will do the right thing by proactively sharing their expenses with the public. He scoffed at the idea that it would create too much extra work for legislative staffs, calling this "a lot of nonsense."

"They get all the bills introduced on time, and that's more complicated than posting your expenses," DePasquale said.

"It's taxpayer money. People have a right to know where it's going."

How to find state legislators' expenses

To find a Pennsylvania senator's monthly expense reports, visit the "Right-to-Know Law" link at the bottom of the pasen.gov webpage.

The next page contains a "Monthly Expense Reports" icon. Visitors can then select the fiscal year, month and senator about whom they'd like information. They can also select "All Monthly Expenses" to see an aggregate of all senators' reimbursement requests in a single document.

These reports can be searched by keyword and are available for download or printing.

To find the per diem and mileage expenses for members of the state House of Representatives, people are required to file a formal Right-to-Know request with the chamber's chief clerk. This can be done by filling out a form found by clicking the "Open Records" link at house.state.pa.us.

Bruce Siwy is a reporter for the USA TODAY Network's Pennsylvania state capital bureau. He can be reached at bsiwy@gannett.com or on X and Instagram at @BruceSiwy.

This article originally appeared on York Daily Record: PA Legislature per diems are online for Senate, not House