For the federal government, grants can be a good way to impact state and municipal policies, purchases, and priorities and for the public, great ways to learn more about how federal financial influence is playing out.

Sitting on the shores of Lake Michigan, Racine, Wisconsin lays claim to inventing the hairdryer and garbage disposal. With Milwaukee to its north and Chicago to its south, the town is tapping into that legacy as the first municipality with fewer than 100,000 residents to be chosen for the Smart Cities Readiness Challenge.

Over the past decade, MuckRock has grown from a simple records request tool to a network of open source platforms that help journalists, researchers, and the public better understand how the world around them works. Help define our next ten years with one of two positions we’ll be hiring for in the coming months.

The state of Tennessee has taken a small step toward more transparency on the incentives it offers businesses to locate or expand in the state.

Much of urban America is in the market for ways to handle the pressures that come with growing and changing populations. Enter “smart cities:” The movement to make municipal planning more efficient and effective for residents, which has a lot of champions but no one-size-fits-all program.