Louisiana government salary database is finally live

The state of Louisiana has made a searchable database of state employee salary information publicly available.

The database is available on the state’s financial transparency website, checkbook.la.gov. It includes all executive branch salary information but does not yet include salaried higher education employees.

The website was the result of a bill brought by Sen. Rick Ward, R-Port Allen, and signed into law by Gov. John Bel Edwards in 2018. Republican leadership at the time wanted  information about state spending made more accessible. The delay in getting the website fully populated came from the variety of different software systems public entities have used to track their internal financial information.