TVA Salary Transparency Act: Public Annual Salary Reports, but No FOIA Requests

The "Tennessee Valley Authority Salary Transparency Act" aims to pull back the curtain on how the TVA spends its money on top-level staff, but it's a mixed bag when it comes to actual transparency.

The bill mandates that the TVA include the names, titles, and salaries of all executives, board members, and any management-level employees making at or above the GS15 pay grade in its annual report. Think of it as a mandatory salary dump for anyone high up on the TVA food chain.

Peeking at Paychecks

This part is pretty straightforward: The TVA will now have to publicly list who's making what at the top. This could be a win for ratepayers and taxpayers who want to see where their money is going. For example, if you're a small business owner paying a hefty electricity bill to a TVA-supplied utility, you'll now get a clearer picture of the salaries your payments are helping to fund. The idea is that by making this information public, the TVA might be more cautious about handing out huge pay packages.

The FOIA Roadblock

Here's where it gets tricky. While the bill forces the TVA to disclose salaries in its annual report, it also specifically blocks access to this same information through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Normally, FOIA lets citizens request government documents, but this bill says "no dice" when it comes to TVA salaries. This means that, while the annual report provides a snapshot, the public can't dig deeper using FOIA requests to, for example, investigate salary histories or compare them across different time periods.

The GS15 Question

The bill uses the GS15 pay grade as the cutoff for who gets included in the salary disclosure. What is not clear is if all high-level positions are classified as GS15 or above, or if some positions could use a different classification system entirely. This could potentially create a loophole where some high-earning individuals might not be subject to the disclosure requirement.

The Big Picture

This bill is a bit of a paradox. It promotes transparency in one way by requiring the annual salary disclosure, potentially deterring excessive compensation. But it also limits transparency by blocking FOIA requests, reducing the public's ability to fully scrutinize TVA's salary practices. It's like getting a peek into the kitchen, but only through a small, pre-approved window.