Transparency Statement: Our Policy on Document Redaction

At Midwest Transparency Audit, our core mission is to provide the public with raw, unaltered government records. You deserve to see exactly what your local administrations are doing, spending, and signing.

 

However, during our ongoing audits of municipal servers and Sunshine Law productions, we frequently encounter a disturbing trend: city governments failing to properly secure their own data. Through standard, legal open-source intelligence gathering, we routinely retrieve exposed files containing active municipal bank routing numbers, vendor financial credentials, and the private home addresses and personal cell phone numbers of everyday citizens simply applying for basic municipal permits.

 

While our mandate is absolute government accountability, we will not facilitate financial fraud or compromise civilian privacy as a result of administrative negligence. Because of this, you may occasionally see localized black redaction blocks on the documents hosted in our archive.

 

Please note that these specific redactions are applied by Midwest Transparency Audit, not the government, and are strictly limited to the following:

• Live Financial Data: Active municipal or vendor checking, routing, and ACH numbers.

• Civilian PII (Personally Identifiable Information): The personal home addresses, private emails, and direct mobile lines of private citizens.

 

Every single detail regarding government expenditures, surveillance vendor contracts, data-sharing agreements, and elected official actions remains 100% visible, unredacted, and open for public scrutiny. We hold the line on transparency, but we refuse to cause collateral damage to private citizens along the way.