FOIA – Page 14 – National Freedom of Information Coalition

Editorial: Staying well informed is a great way to protect your freedom

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Thanks to whistleblowers like Chelsea Elizabeth Manning and Edward Snowden, we are learning to ask what our government knows like informed citizens in a democratic republic should. Manning and Snowden sacrificed their freedom to increase government transparency.

You can uncover a lot of information without the possible risks of whistleblowing using the freedom of information act — FOIA. The FOIA allows people to formally ask the government questions and receive documents that answer those questions.

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Letters: Government shouldnít be afraid of transparency

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Jason Grumet argued in ìGovernment wilting from the sunshineî [Washington Forum, Oct. 2] that transparency measures such as open meetings and records laws have a 'dark side,' one that is presumably responsible for the 77 percent of Americans who do not trust their government most of the time. Perhaps the fact that Congress has exempted itself from the Freedom of Information Act and has no requirements to hold all meetings in public might contribute to the mistrust that troubles Mr. Grumet.

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Op-Ed: Sunstein: Let Public Officials Work in Private

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Senators Patrick Leahy of Vermont and John Cornyn of Texas, leaders of the Judiciary Committee, have long shown an admirable commitment to open government, and their recent bill to amend the Freedom of Information Act is winning a ton of praise. Some of its reforms make sense, but, unfortunately, its key provision is a horrible idea. By reducing the protection now given to deliberations within the executive branch, it would have a chilling effect on those discussions.

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Blog: Leahy-Cornyn Bipartisan FOIA Reform Doesn’t Go Far Enough; Congress Should Exempt EPA from FOIA b(5)

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Regulating is an inherently legislative exercise, in that it entails the promulgation of rules that control private behavior. Indeed, most policy now is rendered via regulation, thanks to the geometric growth of the executive branch during the post-war years.*

However, unlike legislators in congress, executive agency bureaucrats are unaccountable to the electorate. As a result, there’s a danger that executive agencies are effectuating policy absent a popular mandate and away from the public eye.

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Op-Ed: Right to know compromised

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For decades Vermont has been at the bottom of the list of states for the public’s right to know the truth about government operations, records and meetings.

Two years ago, with the strong support of Gov. Peter Shumlin, Secretary of State Jim Condos and others, the Legislature passed a new public records law that improved public access to government documents. Since then, the state has seen steady improvements in its rankings for open government.

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Editorial: Expand public access

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Short of rewriting the Virginia Constitution, there is no better way to recast the relationship between citizens and state government than overhauling the Freedom of Information Act. The law enables oversight of officials who operate on the people's behalf, spends public money and should be subject to scrutiny.

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NARA creates FOIA advisory committee

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The National Archives and Records Administration will create a committee to improve the way the government process Freedom of Information Act request, a May 5 Federal Register notice says.

"NARA has determined that the creation of the FOIA Advisory Committee is in the public interest due to the expertise and valuable advice the Committee members will provide on issues related to improving the administration of FOIA," the notice says.

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FOIA requests, costs increasing in many municipalities

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The law allowing residents and business to request public records may be dubbed the Illinois Freedom of Information Act, but as municipalities are seeing more and more requests come in each year, officials say the cost to comply with the law is anything but free.

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Ruling issued in Iron County (MT) FOIA case

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A resolution has been reached in the case of an Iron County Medical Care Facility (ICMCF) resident who filed a civil lawsuit against the facility, alleging that it had not lawfully complied with the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

Enacted federally in 1966, FOIA allows citizens to obtain access to public records with some exceptions. The state of Michigan passed its own version of FOIA in 1976.

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Report: Some Agencies Struggling with FOIA Requests

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A report published by the nonprofit Center for Effective Government (formerly OMB Watch), has ranked 15 agencies on how well they are implementing the Freedom of Information Act, and it gave seven of them failing grades.

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