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Tag Archive: Open Government

Two Events for Open Government Fans

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We're continuing the Sunshine Week festivities with two events dedicated to promoting a more open government. We invite you to join us, and for those of you who can't make it to Washington, DC, we encourage you to watch the webcasts of the events.

Today at 1pm EDT, in conjunction with Open the Government, Greg Elin of Sunlight Labs will moderate a panel to demonstrate new ways nonprofits have made government data open and useful to the public.

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New FOIA Law Signed

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In all the festivities surrounding the New Year's holiday, you might have missed President Bush signing the Open Government Act of 2007 on Monday without comment, the first reform of the Freedom of Information Act in a decade. David Ardia, director of the Citizen Media Law Project at Harvard Law School's Berkman Center for Internet and Society and the Center for Citizen Media, hails the act for expanding the definition of who is representative of the news media. "This change would significantly benefit bloggers and non-traditional journalists by making them eligible for reduced processing and duplication fees that are available (to members of the media)."

The Associated Press reports that the new law "is aimed at reversing an order by former Attorney General John Ashcroft in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, in which he instructed agencies to lean against releasing information when there was uncertainty about how doing so would affect national security."

(Updated: The Associated Press reported on the new law; the First Amendment Center did not issue a statement as previously reported.)

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FOIA Files Suggest the Truth is Out There…

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...but lots of times just not available through FOIA. The Sunshine in Government Initiative, a coalition of media groups that promotes accessibility, accountability and openness in government policies, has launched the FOIA Files, a repository of descriptions of news and investigative articles that relied on the Freedom of Information Act to pry loose information from the government. It's searchable by agency, date, congressional district and state, and by whether or not the news organization that did the story had to go to court to get the records it sought. I couldn't help noticing a fair number of entries like this one:

The Macon (Ga.) Telegraph, in a report about the public's frequent unawareness of the presence of dangerous chemicals in their neighborhoods, found that the Environmental Protection Agency refused to provide even redacted copies of risk management plan summaries for five counties in and around Macon. The newspaper requested the summaries under FOIA and the EPA acknowledged they are public, but refused to release them because they contain information about worst-case scenarios.
Following FOIA seems to be regarded as optional by a lot of government agencies.

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Information Independence Day

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President Lyndon Johnson signed the landmark Freedom of Information Act law on July 4, 1966. In doing so he declared: "A democracy works best when the people have all the information that the security of the nation will permit." Indeed, when members of the public have diligently pursued information under the FOIA, they have identified government waste and mismanagement and exposed significant controversies about government programs.

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Sigh. Another Secret Hold.

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What is it with bills that create more open and transparent government and secret holds? Last week, a Republican senator placed a secret hold on the OPEN Government Act, a bill that would expand and fill the holes in FOIA. OPEN is cosponsored by Senators Pat Leahy (D-VT) and John Cornyn (R-TX), who have pushed for greater FOIA rights for some time now. As soon as they get the ability to pass the bill someone in Cornyn's party blocks it. We know that the secret hold comes from a Republican because it came through the leadership. This is yet another instance of Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) hiding the identity of a secret holder. Josh at the Seminal has put together a list of senators to call and ask if they placed the secret hold. If you have a moment you should stop by and give your senator a call. Openthegovernment.org, Public Citizen, and the Federation of American Scientists have also put out a call to arms to unmask the secret holder. Do your part and make the call. If they can't end the practice of secret holds anytime soon than we may as well make the secrecy obsolete by unmasking the secret senator every single time.

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House Considers Transparency Measures

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We've been following the progress of a couple of bills making their way through Congress. H.R. 1309 puts a little more teeth in our Freedom of Information Act--the main lever that the press and the public has for prying documents out of the executive branch (and see here for useful FOIA tips maintained by Investigative Reporters & Editors), while S. 223 would, for the first time, require campaign committees of Senate candidates to file their contribution and expenditure information electronically with the Federal Election Commission rather than sending in stacks of paper (both House and Presidential candidates file electronically).

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