FLRA's Website Gets a Makeover

Does it ever. If you have a minute in the next few days, cruise over and check out the Federal Labor Relations Authority's dramatically revamped website. Normally I wouldn't call attention to an agency's website relaunch, but the FLRA hasn't gotten a major refresh since 1997. I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say the old site was almost criminally bad: ugly, difficult to navigate, and lacking a lot of useful information. The new site is night and day better.

The Obama administration has paid a lot of lip service to the web as a tool of transparency, which has mostly meant dumping data, rather than promoting disclosure in a meaningful way. But the FLRA's update is a reminder that the web is a crucial tool for information-gathering, and federal agencies need to meet basic guidelines and expectations for what their websites should look like and include. Once every agency meets those basic standards, then we need apps and tools that can help the public find useful and important data easily.