Boston wants to highlight the increased potential of its overhauled open data portal, Analyze Boston, and is doing so by hosting an open data competition for technologists.
[…]
Read More… from Boston Open Data Challenge Will Highlight City’s New Data Portal
A circuit court judge has ruled that the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department broke the law in refusing to make officer conduct complaints available to the public — and must "permanently" stop concealing those records going forward.
[…]
Read More… from St. Louis Police Must Release Internal Affairs Records to the Public, Court Finds
A circuit court ruling that that said a workers' compensation group violated Florida's open records laws by not ensuring committee hearings and supporting documentation on a proposed rate increase were made available to the public is under appeal.
[…]
Read More… from Florida: Workers’ comp group appeals case regarding Florida’s Sunshine Law
A bill encouraging citizens and state agencies to resolve public records disputes outside court is headed to the governor's desk.
The Senate passed the bill Monday 35-0. It offers mediation as an option when a citizen wants to challenge a government agency's denial of his or her request for public records.
Under Colorado's Open Records Act, such challenges must go to court — an expense that deters many from pursuing their requests.
[…]
Read More… from State Senate Approves Colorado Public Records Mediation
An Oklahoma open records expert said he believes OU’s denial of three Daily open records requests goes beyond the scope of the court ruling on which OU has based its denial.
OU has denied The Daily three requests for the names of university employees who are eligible for its Special Voluntary Retirement Incentive. The program encourages eligible employees to retire early and receive a payment equal to a portion of their salaries, and it has now been implemented a second time as a cost-saving measure.
[…]
Gov. Rick Snyder signed into law legislation that will exempt in-progress bids for public contracts from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests last week.
The legislation had been introduced by Sen. Rick Jones (R-Grand Ledge) in an effort to combat what he said has been abuse of the FOIA system to undercut Michigan businesses.
[…]
A House committee this week approved two bills intended to shine light on political dark money in Colorado.
House Bill 17-1261 would require that anyone spending $1,000 or more in a year on electioneering communications include “paid for” disclosures in those ads. House Bill 17-1262 would close a reporting gap so that spending information on electioneering communications is available throughout a campaign season.
[…]
Read More… from CoFOIC: Political dark money bills approved by Colorado House committee
Each year, Oklahoma legislators and statewide elected officials must report details about their personal finances to alert the public to potential conflicts of interest.
This year, however, they generally will be asked to report fewer facts than ever – that is, since the disclosure rules were approved in 1994.
[…]
[Dick] Conway has worked as an economist and forecaster for business and government for more than 30 years. In 2001, he served on a committee commissioned by the state Legislature to examine Washington’s tax system and how well it functions. He’s continued that research on his own ever since.
In a report released last month, Conway devised a system for ranking the 50 states on the “transparency” of their tax structure — in other words, how easily folks can tell how much they pay in total taxes.
Washington ranked 49th out of 50.
[…]
Read More… from Washington state ranks nearly last in new tax-transparency index
Even the divided Clay County Commission agreed: County Counselor Kevin Graham needed help reducing the backlog of Sunshine Law requests.
But the commission – and several office holders – are split on whether the county should continue employing a Kansas City attorney who charges $373.50 an hour.
Graham had been handling the requests on his own, he said, until the load multiplied.
[…]
