Last week, The Lens (a nonprofit community news venue) unveiled a new tool to increase transparency around government business in New Orleans. The Vaultis a library of more than 5,300 contracts signed by the city of New Orleans.

…Yes, these contracts were already available through the city's website. However, the user interface and search features on the city's site are quite limited, effectively making specific contracts hard to find. Unless you happen to know the name of the contractor or can guess how the contract might be described in city files, you'd probably have to file a public records request -- a process that can take weeks or more.

The Vault uses DocumentCloud, a free tool that helps journalists store, analyze, annotate and publish document collections. With support from a Knight Community Information Challenge grant, developers at The Lens were able to import the city contracts into DocumentCloud and create a user-friendly front-end interface. This process also makes the contracts findable via a normal Google search, and easily shareable by posting links to social media or e-mail.

Steve Myers, managing editor at The Lens, said that the projects was accomplished with several weeks of coding work. "It helped that we weren't starting completely from scratch," he said. "We had a big head start because these documents were already digitized and online. We also were able to modify an existing open-source front end interface."

This process could be replicated by any local news outlet or community foundation, given an collection of public documents available online -- whether government contracts or other filings.

The Lens is working to drive citizen engagement with this resource. "Initially we're reaching out by e-mail to neighborhood activists, potential vendors, neighborhood association leaders -- as well as to all neighborhood association leaderslisted on the city's website."

The Lens is also holding public "office hours" at a few locations around town specifically to explain The Vault, and they're planning other promotional and educational events. In addition, they're reaching out to local media, to explain how The Vault can be a tool for journalists as well as citizens.

"We want to create long-lasting effects, so we're encouraging people to link to specific contracts and share them with their friends and neighbors to stimulate discussion," said Myers.

The Lens also is using this content as a way to boost civic literacy. Staff writer Charles Maldonado posted a tutorial: How to read a government contract.

In the coming weeks, The Lens hopes to learn more about how New Orleans residents might want to use The Vault, and what questions this resource can help people answer. "What features could we add that would make it more appealing for regular people to use?" said Myers. "We definitely want to let that guide further development of this project."

Eventually the Lens plans to add to The Vault other publicly available information about the companies getting city contracts. "Business records and campaign finance records are on our to-do list," wrote Myers in his article introducing The Vault.