National Freedom of Information Coalition
Protecting Your Right to Open Government

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Posts by NFOIC

New lawsuit demands Office of Legal Counsel emails

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A new lawsuit is demanding public release of emails from the executive branch's go-to office for legal advice: the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel.

The Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, filed on New Year's Day by a lawyer for Vice News reporter Jason Leopold, seeks emails from the accounts of three former top officials at OLC: Marty Lederman, David Barron and Virginia Seitz.  Continue…

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Washington DC: Mayor Bowser Just Made DC’s Economic Data Open-Source

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On Wednesday, Mayor Muriel Bowser's administration launched a new economic development dashboard, with the aim of providing District residents with easily accessible data on employment, income and housing. The Mayor's office said the site was developed in response to demand from residents for more data, specifically around the status of affordable housing projects and other construction around the District. The administration built the dashboard after seeing the success of District's Real Estate Project Pipeline, last year.

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Data sharing: An open mind on open data

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It is a movement building steady momentum: a call to make research data, software code and experimental methods publicly available and transparent. A spirit of openness is gaining traction in the science community, and is the only way, say advocates, to address a 'crisis' in science whereby too few findings are successfully reproduced. Furthermore, they say, it is the best way for researchers to gather the range of observations that are necessary to speed up discoveries or to identify large-scale trends.

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Editorial: Protecting cops and ‘public’ records (Wisconsin)

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Newspapers advocate open records for good reason. Without the ability to obtain, review and report on government records, we can’t effectively do what the Founders intended an unencumbered press to do: keep a watch on government and its powers in check. Minus that ability, the liberty and rights of American citizens can fall prey to an omnipotent government.

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Oklahoma State auditor reacts to attorney general hiring independent auditor

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There’s a heated battle between elected leaders of two state agencies.  This year, the attorney general’s office is set to be audited by the state, like dozens of other agencies.

But, that won’t happen with AG Scott Pruitt if he has his way.  Continue…

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EPA Launches eDisclosure System

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On December 9, 2015, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officially launched its new electronic portal for the submission of certain voluntary disclosures of federal environmental violations under its self-audit policies. The details of the eDisclosure system are largely consistent with what EPA presented during its June 2015 announcement and related webinars, as discussed in the June 2015 Thompson Hine Environmental Update, with a few important distinctions.

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Nominations invited for 2016 class of the National Freedom of Information Hall of Fame

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WASHINGTON – Nominations are invited for inductees to the 2016 class of the National Freedom of Information Hall of Fame, which honors those who have made significant contributions to developing, protecting and expanding access to government information.

Nominations will be accepted through Jan. 23, 2016, and should be made by e-mail. Nominations should include a statement of qualifications and links to supporting information, data or reports; and must include the name, e-mail and telephone contact information the nomination.

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Florida First Amendment Foundation Announces Winners of the 2015 Pete Weitzel /Friend of the First Amendment Award

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

December 29, 2015

CONTACT: Katherine Garner, 850.224.4555

or katherine@floridafaf.org 

 

FLORIDA'S FIRST AMENDMENT FOUNDATION ANNOUNCES WINNER OF THE 2015 PETE WEITZEL/FRIEND OF THE FIRST AMENDMENT AWARD

                 

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