Sunlight Foundation

National News

• Some of the earliest causalities of the government shutdown have been the various Federal watchdogs. The GAO won't be publishing reports, the CBO will be drastically reducing their workload, and FOIA processing is being crippled by "nonessential" status.  (Washington Times)
• The Federal Election Commission may be down to only the four active commissioners, but they want campaigns and candidates to continue filing their campaign finance reports. While the servers are still up and running, there's no telling what might happen if the shutdown drags on, keeping the folks who make sure the computers are working away from their desks. (Washington Post)
• Lobbyists aren't letting the shutdown close their calendars. Despite logistical issues and the budget standoff sucking oxygen away from any other issue,  many lobbyists reporting attempting to keep up a normal workload around the hill.  (POLITICO)
• In non-shutdown news, a Nevada lawyer and lobbyist with close ties to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was sent to the slammer for two years after being found guilty of making more than $100,000 worth of straw donations to Reid's 2008 campaign. Reid has not been specifically implicated in the scheme. (POLITICO)

• A group in Madagascar is tracking presidential platforms ahead up elections later this month. Madatsara breaks election issues down into 9 topic areas and compares the various candidates stances on the issues. (Global Voices)
• Singapore is looking to open source solutions to push forward business analytics development for future projects. The government signed a Memorandum of Understanding with leading open source provider Red Hat recently. (Future Gov)
• Efforts underway in Wales will hopefully result in a better system to track transit access in Wales. The Welsh government commissioned Mapumental to figure out how to plot transit times to and from a variety of points. (My Society)

• A new app from a Code for America team in South Bend, Indiana takes aim at the city's vacant housing problem. CityVoice is a voice-based app allows citizens to report vacant houses by making a quick phone call. (Code for America)

National News

• A number of privacy advocates are urging the House bipartisan Privacy Working Group to hold their meetings with tech companies in the open. The working group held its first meeting last week and has 10 more scheduled. (The Hill)
• Former Senator Scott Brown (R-MA) clearly likes seeing his name in the newspapers, but isn't so happy when it pops up in fundraising emails sent by potential political opponents. Brown, who is reportedly looking to return to the Senate via New Hampshire, where he vacations, attacked a fundraising email sent by Current New Hampshire Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D), calling it "shameful" to use his potential candidacy to raise money. (POLITICO)
• There were plenty of stories yesterday detailing the varying effects of the government shut down, including which agencies and which websites would go dark. A spot check of 56 Federal websites indicates that only 10 will go entirely dark, although others will be partially inaccessible. (ars techinca)

• There are many dedicated hobbyists creating tools with open government data, but so far few of them have transferred their ideas into sustainable, successful business models. A recent workshop held in Uruguay by the World Bank Group's Open Finances Team aimed to provide advice for open data nerds looking to take their ideas into a new realm. (World Bank Open Data Blog)

• Looking for "a comprehensive history" of open data in Chicago? Check out this blog post. (Data-Smart City Solutions)
• Oakland keeps up its week of good open gov news with a new web app aimed at helping the city manage and track incoming public records requests. RecordTrac allows users to track the progress of their requests and publicly archives all fulfilled requests. (Code for America)
• Newly released emails appear to indicate that Michael Bloomberg has followed in the footsteps of numerous public officials and used a private email account for some not-so-private business. The outgoing New York Mayor and billionaire exchanged emails with a deputy mayor using an @bloomberg.net email address. (DNAInfo)

National News

• The government is officially shut down and the closure will effect a wide range of government websites from the vital to the frivolous but fun. (Washington Post)
• The effects of the government shut down will spread all the way to K street. With Federal employees and Congressional staff stuck at home, lobbyists, already frustrated with the lack of work getting done by the 113th Congress, will have even less to influence. (POLITICO)
• The shut down might also slow down the party circuit in Washington. In the hours before the shut down numerous fundraisers were still scheduled, but now that the doors of government have been locked fundraisers and candidates are looking to push back or cancel their events. (POLITICO)
• The Federal Election Commission hasn't been able to do much work recently given the deadlock on the body, but with the shut down it will truly stop. The agency, with the exception of its politically appointed commissioners, will see all of its employees furloughed. (Public Integrity)

• The Vice President of the European Parliament spoke out against proposed reforms to lobbying transparency rules in the body. Rainer Wieland claimed that reforms could present a serious administrative burden and limit the institution's work.  (EurActive)
• While Argentina does not yet have a Freedom of Information law, three civil society organizations have collaborated on a portal to post the asset disclosures of public servants and elected officials online. (Open Knowledge Blog)

• The Texas Attorney General ruled that a member of the state legislature has to release records related to her communication with the American Legislative Exchange Council. The records were sought by the Wisconsin based Center for Media and Democracy. (FOI Foundation Texas)
• Oakland , California is continuing its trek towards a citywide open data policy. The city council published a proposed policy that could get a vote as soon as October 15. (Govfresh)

National News

• Big data gets bigger every day, but for the government to make the best use of its growing stores of information data governance structures need to be put in place. (Federal Computer Week)
• A new analysis of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which Congressional Republicans have long hated and recently vowed again to destroy, finds that the agency has made strides in its first three years, but its best actions happened in a transparent, iterative manner. (Government Executive)
• There are more women serving in the halls of Congress than ever, but women haven't changed the amount of money they've given to political causes all that much over the past 25 years. (Open Secrets)
• Early next month the Supreme Court is set to hear the latest attack on campaign finance regulation. McCutcheon vs. FEC deals with limits on the overall level of contributions that individuals can spread around to various federal candidates. (National Journal)
• Newly declassified documents show that the NSA spied on prominent American critics of the war in Vietnam, including Martin Luther King, Jr., and two powerful member's of Congress Sen. Frank Church (D-Id) and Rep. Howard Baker (R-TN). (Georgetown Security Law Brief)

• The UK's Independent Reporting Mechanism has a new report out about Britain's first OGP National Action Plan. The timing is appropriate, as the country is prepping its second NAP, to be revealed next month at the OGP meeting in London. (Open Government Partnership)
• The Somali central bank signed a lobbying contract with the Podesta group as corruption allegations swirled around it earlier this month. Abdusalam Omer resigned as head of the bank a week after signing the deal, but claimed his resignation had nothing to do with the allegations. (The Hill)

• The National Association of Manufacturers is building itself a new arm. The new legal center will help its members when they want to lobby on the local, state, and federal levels. (POLITICO)

National News

• Big data is having some big impacts on government according to this piece, which highlights three. Data is helping to enhance security and prevent fraud, it is improving service delivery and emergency response, and finally data is democratizing information access. (Federal Computer Week)
• Jim Messina, one of President Obama's right hand men, was named to the board of directors of LanzaTech, a green energy firm that recently snagged millions in federal contracts and has financial backing from a major Obama donor. In addition to serving in a top White House job and running Obama's reelection campaign, Messina heads up Organizing for Action. (The Washington Times)
• The House Ethics Committee is about to lose its staff director. Dan Schwager, who has served in the position since 2011 and overseen investigations into the actions of several high profile members of Congress, is expected to step down by the end of the year. (POLITICO)
• Many public companies are being proactive about the reporting the money that they spend on politics, with firms from the pharmaceutical, IT, chemical, health, and defense industries ranking highest in a new survey. It's not all good news those, plenty of companies still refuse to share any information. (Public Integrity)

• Ghanaian deputy finance minister Cassiel Ato Forson spoke in favor of stronger and more transparent public financial management systems at a workshop devoted to pushing the topic forward in West Africa. Official's cited the global economic crisis and its continuing fallout as reasons to explore more transparent financial systems.  (Ghana Business News)
• Thailand is taking inspiration from I Paid a Bribe for their new corruption portal. The new website, launched by the Office of the Auditor General, allows citizens to report bribery and other corruption that they encounter. (Future Gov)

National News

• After taking some time off 7-Eleven, the convenience store chain known for helping cure the munchies at all hours of the day or night, is re-opening its corporate PAC. Recently, the chain has been interested in immigration reform and attempting to become eligible for the SNAP program. (Roll Call)
• After some delay, the Senate approved President Obama's two recent nominees to the FEC. Republican Lee Goodman and Democrat Ann Ravel were approved by unanimous consent and will join the board shortly. (Public Integrity)
• Aneesh Chopra, the first ever US CTO, argued that APIs are the wave towards open data in the future. After an unsuccesful run for public office, Chopra recently joined up with Apigee, an API manegment and strategy company. (Government Technology)

• China is planning to lift its restrictive internet rules, including its ban on Facebook, but only within the Shanghai Free-Trade Zone.  (SCMP)
• A new report looks at fledgling FOI laws in emerging democracies, identifying a number of ways that existing FOI legislation can be improved. (NDI Democracy Works)
• Before his speech at the UN yesterday President Obama spoke at a roundtable on ways that Civil Society can be supported around the world. He argued that the future of democracy depends on support for NGO and citizen involvement in public affairs. (POLITICO)

• The Center for Urban Science and Progress, a new research center launched in downtown Brooklyn, aims to become the world's authority on "urban informatics." It is housed within New York University and takes advantage of private funding from IBM, Microsoft, Cisco, and more. (The Atlantic Cities)
• New York kept rolling out open data news this week. Yesterday it was the Big Apple releasing their Open Data Compliance Plan, which was a requirement of the 2012 open data law and outlined a timeline for release of more than 400 data-sets through 2018. The release is surely impressive, but some noted important data sets that weren't mentioned. (Tech President)

National News

• Last week, the Department of Defense made headlines for lacking a functioning fax machine with which to accept FOIA requests. This week, the machine appears to have been replaced, despite initial estimates by the DoD that it would have to wait until the new fiscal year to get its FOIA process back up and running. (The Verge)
• A top FCC staffer is heading to lobbing behemoth Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld. Gregory Guice, who most recently led the FCC's legislative affairs shop and has been with the regulator for more than a decade, will join the number 2 lobbying firm in D.C., likely working with telecom clients like AT&T, Cox, and more. (The Hill)
• The party fundraising committees reported their most recent results last week and the results were a mixed bag. The RNC continues to out-raise the DNC by handy margins, while on the Congressional side the DCCC and DSCC pulled in more than their Republican counterparts. (POLITICO, POLITICO, Roll Call)
• It has become relatively common knowledge that President's like to reward big donors and bundlers with cushy ambasadorial gigs, but this handy map makes it clear just how wide-spread the practice is under Obama. (Public Integrity)

• Code for America Brigades have been springing up across America for some time, and now they are making the trip across the ocean. The local civic hacking program will expand internationally with groups in Ireland, Japan, and Poland. (Code for America)
• There is no shortage of parliamentary monitoring organizations in Africa as this list, complete with links and other information, makes clear. (Indigo Trust)
• Six years ago civil society groups in Palestine nearly passed an access to information law. This year they are giving it another go with a new report and push for the Palestinian Authority to institute a law. (Transparency International)

• As Mayor Michael Bloomberg runs out the clock on his time at the helm of New York troubling news is emerging about his records retention policies. The city is only planning to save emails from a small number of agencies to ward off against future litigation. No decision has been made about emails from the NYPD, FDNY, and Department of Education. (DNA Info)
• In more New York News, Governor Andrew Cuomo appointed three special advisors to push forward on the state's open data initiatives. Andrew Nicklin, former R&D director at New York's IT department will lead Open NY. James Hendler, who was an advisor on data.gov, will work on the open.ny.gov platform. He will be joined by Theresa Pardo, director of the Center for Technology in Government at the University of Albany. (Tech President)