Senate speaker unveils website to monitor government waste

Senate Speaker Ron Ramsey, crowning himself the state’s chief red tape cutter, unveiled a website Monday to give Tennesseans a venue to vent their frustrations over government regulations.

Ramsey promised his office would look into each complaint submitted to TnRedTape.com and try to offer relief from what he called overbearing and oppressive regulations.

“We’ll have to figure out how this plays out and how many of these complaints come in,” he said at a news conference. “But I’m going to tell you what. If we have to dedicate one person and we have to dedicate a staff member to this, this will be the best money the state of Tennessee has ever spent. I don’t know what the response to this is going to be. But let me assure you, I’ll make sure that we have the manpower that’s needed to dedicate to this, even if we have to pull somebody off something else, because this is so important.”

The website also will aggregate stories of government red tape in the news, Ramsey said.

“The best thing that government can do to promote economic growth is to stay out of the way of people who create jobs,” he said. “This website is designed to help highlight and expose the barriers government puts in the way of entrepreneurs trying to put people to work.”