WASHINGTON — Even as Congress moved last week to make the way it allocates money more transparent, members of Hawai'i's delegation decline to reveal what special funding projects they may be seeking, preferring to disclose them only when they are included in a spending bill.

Sens. Daniel K. Inouye and Daniel K. Akaka and Rep. Mazie Hirono, all Hawai'i Democrats, voted for the bill, which requires that special projects, known as earmarks, be identified by the lawmaker that had it included in a bill. Lawmakers also must state their families would not directly benefit financially from the earmarks.

Rep. Neil Abercrombie, D-Hawai'i, who also will not disclose his earmark requests, said he voted against the bill because it was too easy to avoid complying with the lobbying reforms in it.

So far this year, Inouye and Akaka have put their names on more than $230 million of projects for next year in Senate versions of spending bills, including $30.2 million for dry dock improvements at Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard.

From 2005 through this year, the state has received almost $1.4 billion in earmark projects, according to an analysis by Citizens Against Government Waste, which tracks project spending. Hawai'i usually ranks among the top three states nationally in spending on a per capita basis, according to the group's analysis.

President Bush is expected to sign the ethics bill, which would require more disclosure on lawmakers' efforts to pay for earmarks. The bill is seen as an improvement because it no longer would allow sponsors to add spending projects anonymously to legislation.

But the bill does not require lawmakers to disclose the earmarks they seek in advance of the legislation being filed, although dozens of lawmakers already do.

Inouye, known for his ability to steer hundreds of millions of federal dollars annually to Hawai'i, said he doesn't want to disclose requests because he doesn't want to get people's hopes up prematurely when he tries to obtain earmarks.

Inouye, a subcommittee chairman on the Senate Appropriations Committee, said he is not trying to hide anything, and he discloses earmarks after they are adopted as part of a bill.

"I don't want to be the one to be conveying bad tidings," Inouye said,"but it's no secret. The request is put in there, and we vote on it."

Akaka echoed the sentiment, saying he supported openness in government but didn't want to disclose his earmark requests before they were added to legislation.

"After they finally get accepted, then we can publish," Akaka said. "Releasing a preliminary list of requests could lead to false hope and disappointment."

Earmark requests usually are for home state projects and programs popular with local interests. But the earmark process has come under greater scrutiny after high-profile corruption scandals, such as those involving former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, R-Calif., who is in prison for taking bribes in exchange for earmarks, and convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who called the House Appropriations Committee a "favor factory."

Bringing home federal dollars is something Hawai'i lawmakers have excelled at.

Over the years, Citizens Against Government Waste has cited Inouye frequently, giving him the "Pacific Fleeced Award" in 2006 for directing $482 million in federal spending that year to Hawai'i.

Leslie K. Paige, a spokeswoman for the watchdog group, said disclosing earmarks is necessary to help reduce corruption and waste in government and called the Hawai'i delegation's arguments against releasing their earmark requests in advance "infantile."

"It shows a lack of political courage and political will and a lack of judgment," she said. "They don't want to be forced into a position of having to say 'no' to somebody or to make a judgment."

Hirono said her policy is to make public all the requests that have been included in spending bills, such as her $24 million in earmarks included in the House-version of the agriculture spending bill announced last week.

"Before that, it is just premature," she said.

Abercrombie said he "would never" disclose his requests in advance.

"First of all, you get many more requests than you remotely can deal with," he said.

Disclosing the requests could mean lists of hundreds of projects, most of which will not be acted on, Abercrombie said.

Abercrombie said Hawai'i earmarks are coordinated among the state's four-member delegation to maximize their chances of getting as many as possible funded.

Part of it is to keep other states' delegations from knowing too much about what is being requested until the projects are incorporated in legislation, "especially when you have limited funds," Abercrombie said.

"If people don't like what we did, then that is their judgment, and they have made the judgment over the years that our judgment has been pretty good," he said. "I think they are quite content that we know what we are doing and that we are acting on their behalf."

Reach Dennis Camire at dcamire@gns.gannett.com.