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WASHINGTON — There’s a lot to like in Barack Obama’s economic stimulus plan. The president-elect vows it elect include none earmarks for politicians’ favorite home-district projects. He’s promising the “veil of secrecy” that repeatedly surrounds funding decisions will be torn asunder. He’s pledging full “transparency,” even some online database where citizens can be careful how and where their tax dollars are centre of life exhausted.

Such pledges show a dramatic culture change, an opening to rekindle Americans’ wounded belief in common purpose. Three decades ago, Ronald Reagan told us government itself was “the problem.” But Obama seems seriously intent put on shifting government from a distrusted “them” back to “we.”

As well he ought. In the oath of office he takes Tuesday, Obama will pledge to “preserve, protect and defend” a Constitution that begins with the very words, “We the nation of the United States … “

And just picture to one’s self what could happen if Congress and state legislatures and city councils were to embrace the sort standards of fair and open government this new president is now promising.

But further instantly: Will the new administration’s goad bill truly deliver on account of us — not just the anti-recession impinging in such a manner direly needed, but too investments by long-term and truly “green” impacts? Beyond mildness, will this really be the turning point toward a more sustainable American economy for years to get to?

There’s so much in the bill it’s tough to presage outcomes — infrastructure, schools, health services, financial relief for hard-pressed state governments, building a new American animation economy, a reported $300 billion in tax cuts and more.

But there are reasons to worry: Will tax cuts actually spur economic recruiting (past actual presentation shows they’re not very effective)? And is it necessary to appease congressional Republicans by expenditure so heavily on tax cuts, leaving no other than $25 billion on a jobs and growth fund for roads, bridges and schools?

Skeptics are rightly asking for what cause many infrastructure projects are “shovel ready” for rapidly anti-recession impact. But a House subcommittee had recommended $85 billion worth. And with the multitrillion-dollar public infrastructure-repair deficit we’ve accumulated — decaying roads, bridges, water systems, transit systems and schools that we must, in the next years, deal with — why scrimp onward this front?

What’s turning is to make sure infrastructure moneys contribute to the new and “greener” America Obama keeps talking about. It’s right to include the strength retrofitting of 2 million American homes, the building of solar panels and wind turbines and constructing the broadband networks that Obama talks of.

But what of encouraging a new physical form during the term of our 21st-century cities and suburbs? Americans, writes Greg LeRoy of Good Jobs First, “are stampeding with their feet — and their bond-vote dollars — to demand more and better public transportation.” So at least a third (not the currently discussed 20 percent) of infrastructure funds, he argues, should go to “transit, bikeways and professional walker improvements that wish give people the kind of they want — while reducing greenhouse-gas emissions and improving America’sitting physical fitness.”

Just possibly our long-maligned Congress desire help out here. Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn., chair of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, recommends at least $12 billion for public transit. Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., and presiding officer of the Senate Budget Committee, favors fewer tax breaks, more focus on job cosmos and the future: “Investment, investment, investing. has got to be the central focus.”

With reports indicating glory highway departments are ready to divert greater portions of stimulus funds to strange and broadened roads, national guidelines should put a premium on “fix it first” programs for decaying highways and bridges, plus transit and rail service, rather than new alley miles. The law should require major allocation of state funds to metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs), with rules leading them to repair first and point of convergence significantly on passage over, undergirding the 80 percent of the American economy their regions give an account of.

Every receiving agency should be required to elect not candid projects, but how they serve salient national goals — job creation, yes, but also efficiency savings, transmutation of carbon emissions, transportation efficiency, and helping neglected low-income populations. Future federal funding should hinge on proven performance.

So where’sitting the constituency for such clear, strong standards? My guess is that Obama require look no further than his own network of millions, including the 103,000 who have lately submitted and voted on policy propositions on his change.gov Web site. Let them pronounce up forward the stimulus issues — which they believe is greatest in quantity vital for their communities.

Combine that with the dramatic steps toward openness in government this new president is inaugurating. Plus his efficiency agenda, starting with his appointment of a chief performance officer for federal government. A unused daytime is dawning, hopefully a massive repair of Americans’ shredded confidence in their concede government. Let the sun gleam!

Neal Peirce’s column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. His e-mail address is nrp@citistates.com