Orland School District 135′s Open Book made its debut this month.

Open Book is a section on the district’s website, www.orland135.org, to increase its transparency of information released to the public.

Community relations director Bridget McGuiggan said the district joined other area agencies such as the village of Orland Park, Consolidated High School District 230 and the Orland Fire Protection District in beefing up the amount of information available to the public.

She said she followed the 10 guidelines set by the Illinois Policy Institute. Some of the guidelines included information on elected and administrative officials, meeting information, public records, budgets, financial audits, expenditures, salary and benefits, contracts, lobbying, and taxes and fees.

The IPI audits the information and McGuiggan said the district received a score of 85 out of 100.

“That’s 200 percent better than our last score,” McGuiggan said. “We could get a few extra points added and we’ll be at 88.5. Some of the pieces we are missing can be added over time. Give it time and we could get to 100 percent. The most time consuming aspect is scanning board packets (from past years). That might be a summer project if time allows.”

D135 board member Joe LaMargo, who was in charge of a similar project as deputy clerk of the village of Orland Park, lauded McGuiggan and her staff for the high marks.

“I can tell you it is seriously not an easy task,” LaMargo said. “It’s maddening. But they did a great job.”