Not so big government sites

The Census Bureau released this summary of facts about veterans in the United States in honor of Veteran's Day in the United States, and that got me to thinking about other government sites, and whether they are the go-to sites for many people. (Do most people seek this stuff out? Not in my circle...). I decided to cruise around the government sites this afternoon - not for *fun* exactly, but because I never do - and that one of the points of this blog. So. Here are some facts and tools I stumbled across:

• A federal inmate locator is available from the Bureau of Prisons. Data from 1982 on, and includes the prisoner number, age, sex, race and date of release or prison location.
• The University of Minnesota Honeycrisp apple patent is going to expire soon.
  
• The Department of Housing and Urban Development has a lot of information for prospective and current homeowners. Minneapolis has some home improvement and mortgage fraud prevention programs too.
• Grand Forks, ND has the 5th highest concentration of librarians working in the area, and they make (on average) more than I do. Everybody makes more than I do.
  
• Southdale is a Federal Depository Library, and you can probably find the Federal Register there.
  
• Ben's Guide is still a helluva lot easier to understand than the Goverment Printing Office's other resources.
• FedStats, FirstGov, and GovEngine are pretty good starting places, for the times you don't want to rely on Google or can't remember the name of the agency you're looking for.
  

There are so many sites for specific issues, like education, health, drought, and legislation. But what I didn't know before today is that you can comment on some open dockets. How very 2.0 of them. Ha!