Rejecting a practice commonly used by some government boards, the Iowa Supreme Court has ruled that private meetings can be illegal even when a majority of members aren't physically present.
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Read More… from Iowa Supreme Court: Open meetings law extends to public officials’ proxies
Emails went missing the first time D.C. television reporters asked for agency staff communications that could shed light on weak preparations for a sudden snow storm on Jan. 20. And no one is saying why.
As the "News 4 I-Team" reported last week, their first request yielded a total of zero records — none. This of course seemed highly unlikely, as D.C. residents had been howling that night about city streets and roads that were untreated sheets of ice.
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Read More… from D.C. Transparency Watch: Appeal needed for NBC4 to get D.C. emails
There is a continuing and growing friction between the public and public institutions surrounding the public’s right (by law) to access information generated by their government and the reality to actually access that information. The friction centers on governments’ lack of resources, training or motivation to perform their legal duties as public records stewards.
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Read More… from Editorial: The Public Library as the new Public Records Steward
Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan released her office’s annual Public Access Report Wednesday, the timing of which coincided with Sunshine Week, the celebration of laws that ensure Illinoisans’ access to governmental records and meetings.
Madigan reported that the state’s Public Access Bureau received thousands of requests in 2015 for help in gaining access to public information – 4,770, to be exact.
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Read More… from Editorial: Public access woes in Illinois cloud Sunshine Week
The group has been a fierce advocate for transparency, regularly championing investigations that rely on public documents to hold government officials accountable.
But over the past year, the Union of Concerned Scientists, a Cambridge-based advocacy group that represents thousands of scientists around the country, has campaigned to limit the scrutiny of scientists who work for public universities and agencies through public records requests.
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Read More… from How public must science be? Union of Concerned Scientists would limit disclosures
A top House lawmaker who led the charge to require politically active nonprofits to reveal their donors, a lightning rod issue opposed by Gov. Greg Abbott, says he wants Texas voters to decide the issue at the ballot box.
State Rep. Byron Cook, a Republican from Corsicana who narrowly won re-election earlier this month, said he is planning to propose next legislative session an amendment to the state constitution on the issue of disclosing so-called "dark money" donors.
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Read More… from ‘Dark money’ disclosure fight heading back to the Texas Legislature
As the presidential election approaches in November, Secretary of State William F. Galvin is pushing a proposal that would allow victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking to register to vote without making their addresses public in voter rolls.
“They shouldn’t have to give up the right to vote to be safe,” Galvin said last Wednesday in a telephone interview. “We’ve had many inquiries, especially this year as the presidential elections have been ramping up.”
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Read More… from Should all voter addresses be publicly listed?
With police departments across California continuing to equip their officers with body cameras, state lawmakers are trying again to set rules for their use, including one of the thorniest policy issues: who gets to see the footage and when.
The debate will force legislators to weigh deep transparency and privacy concerns that don’t have clear ideological answers, as is evidenced in the details that have emerged from two competing bills within the Democratic caucus.
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During a presidential election — particularly one as compelling and unpredictable as this one — it can be easy to lose track of elections happening at the state level. It can be even easier to forget about state-level campaign finance, given the truly massive amounts spent at the federal level. But millions of dollars will be spent on state and local elections this year, too, and it’s just as important to track where this money comes from.
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Read More… from How do states rank on campaign contribution disclosure?
Government emails about the Flint water crisis stirred public outrage in Michigan when year-old messages showed the governor’s staff knew the danger of tap water contamination but took no action.
Here in Colorado, as the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition reported last year, government email records more than a few months old may already be lost.
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Read More… from Retention of government emails in Colorado ‘an honor system thing’
