LEWISTON – Local officials were praised during a U.S. Senate committee hearing on Thursday for quickly launching an easy-to-access Web site for residents to keep track of federal stimulus dollars.

The oversight hearing, held by the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, examined the progress made by state and local governments in developing plans for the funds and establishing local controls to track them.

“What we’re trying to do is focus on establishing safeguards to prevent waste, fraud and abuse that would be objectionable, to stop it before it happens,” said U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, the committee’s top Republican, in a phone interview.

Carolyn M. Coleman, a representative of the National League of Cities, told lawmakers that Lewiston was one of the cities that had established a stimulus Web site.

“They are making it a little easier and a little more transparent for not only citizens but also vendors in their communities,” she said during the hearing.

Ian Houseal, Lewiston’s assistant to the city administrator, said the Web site was a team effort.

“Eventually, it’s going to include information for the date we received funding, the amount we received, who our vendors were for each project, the expenditures and other information for the jobs this has created,” Houseal said.

Collins said it’s important to make stimulus fund information as accessible as possible to local municipalities and small civic organizations.

“It’s too complicated,” she said. “For a small fire department to be expected to go through 30 different Web sites to find out if it’s eligible for a grant is not a good system. We need something more consolidated.”

By holding oversight hearings, Collins said she hopes to “keep the heat” on federal officials to solve problems that arise.

Houseal said the biggest challenge he is running into is keeping up with the extensive but varied reporting requirements for grants from federal agencies and departments.

“Once you get to the grant application, each one has their own separate requirements and what they are asking for is pretty intense,” he said. “I’d really like some guidance. I’d love there to be consistency among the departments, but at this point the grants that are out there are not (consistent).”

Collins said she had asked the Office of Management and Budget, which is helping to oversee the stimulus funds, to provide more direction to state and local officials about the money that is available and how they can spend it.

“This is an area where the administration needs to provide much clearer information to states,” she said. “The more specific they can be, the better.”

If stimulus money isn’t used appropriately, the federal government can call for it to be returned. That’s something Collins said she doesn’t want to see happen to officials making good-faith efforts to follow the law.

Collins’ committee will continue to hold periodic hearings to oversee the stimulus funds, she said.

On the Web: For more information about Lewiston’s stimulus funding opportunities, visit http://www.ci.lewiston.me.us/finance/stimulus.htm.