Delaware advocates urge passage of inspector general bill as part of decadeslong fight for more government transparency

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Advocates are complaining that Delaware state lawmakers are again slow-walking legislation that would create a statewide inspector general’s office.

Keith Steck, a board member of the Delaware Coalition for Open Government, also known as DELCOG, wrote a letter urging the legislature to pass the bill before the session ends June 30.

“It’s gotten a lot of support within the ranks — rank and file legislators, both Democrats and Republicans up and down the state,” he said. “But the problem has been it stalls. It stalls with the leadership [over] the last couple of years and this year is no exception.”

DELCOG spokesperson John Flaherty said they are pushing for an independent inspector general because they have fought for over 20 years to make Delaware’s Freedom of Information Act laws more transparent, only to encounter fierce pushback from government officials.

Delaware got an “F” for government accountability and ethics a decade ago from The Center for Public Integrity. Since then, little has been done to improve the system.

State Sen. Laura Sturgeon, D-Brandywine Hundred, is sponsoring the legislation. It’s awaiting a hearing in the Senate Finance Committee, where it languished last year. It passed out of the Senate Executive Committee in March.

This year’s version is similar to the one from 2024, which was also sponsored by Sturgeon. It would create an independent inspector general position tasked with finding instances of fraud, waste and abuse within state government and the General Assembly. The inspector general would hire a staff, which would be required to be certified in investigation, auditing or evaluation within three years. The office would have subpoena power to compel document production and issue public reports exposing corruption and wrongdoing.

Under the proposal, a selection panel would give the governor three names to choose from in appointing the inspector general, who would have to be confirmed by the Senate. The person would serve in the role for five-year terms.

This year’s bill has Senate leadership of both parties as additional sponsors, but lacks the names of any of the House Democratic leadership. House Minority Leader Tim Dukes is on the bill.

An obstacle to its passage, leaders in both chambers say, is the price tag. To establish the office, it’s estimated to cost more than $590,000 in fiscal year 2026, $1.4 million in FY 2027 and $1.5 million in FY 2028.

Sturgeon said she’s optimistic her legislation will get through this year despite not being included in either former Gov. John Carney’s recommended budget or Gov. Matt Meyer’s “budget reset.” Meyer did voice his support for an inspector general’s office in his April State of the State address.

“I found it interesting that he did the budget reset before the state of the state, and he did not fund my bill, even though it had been filed,” Sturgeon said. “Yet he mentioned it in the state of the state, which is awesome, and I’m so happy that he gave attention to this very important office that we want to create. But I don’t know how meaningful it is if he wasn’t willing to add it to his budget.”

Meyer’s office did not say why the governor did not fund the bill in his budget. His spokesperson reiterated his support for an independent inspector general’s office and said he is monitoring the bill’s progress.

State Sen. Trey Paradee, Senate Finance Committee chairman and co-chair of the joint budget writing committee, said bills with fiscal notes won’t be heard until they get the latest state revenue numbers and a better sense of how global tariffs and possible federal Medicaid cuts could impact Delaware.

The next state revenue numbers come in on May 19, and lawmakers start marking up the budget in early June.

Creating an inspector general’s office has been discussed as far back as 2007. Bills introduced in 2022 failed to garner the support of leadership in both chambers. The issue gained renewed interest after recent scandals, including WHYY News’s exclusive reporting in May 2024 that a former state employee stole about $181,000 in 2023 from Delaware’s unemployment trust fund. It’s unclear whether the state has been able to recover any of the money that was taken.

The trust fund in 2024 remains “unauditable” as it was in 2023, and the Department of Labor did not respond to WHYY’s News request last month for an update on system upgrades.

This story was supported by a statehouse coverage grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.