by Eric Newton
Each spring for 10 years now, a vast media conspiracy has rolled across the hills and plains of this nation. Journalists of every stripe – cartoonists to commentators to hard news reporters – have been in on it. And not just journalists, but politicians, educators and librarians, as well as members of nonprofits and civic groups.
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With Sunshine Week less than two weeks away, the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty and Wisconsin Reporter are pursuing legal action that aims to open up government records to the public.
On Tuesday, WILL, a Milwaukee-based public interest law firm, on behalf of Wisconsin Reporter, filed a lawsuit against Jefferson County and its policy calling for the wholesale redaction of identifying information from routine police reports and citations.
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Read More… from WILL, Wisconsin Reporter sue to open government records
Celebrating Sunshine Week 2015, the National Press Club's Freedom of the Press Committee will join with the D.C. Open Government Coalition to present the fourth annual "D.C. Open Government Summit" on March 17 from 6 to 8:30pm in the National Press Club's First Amendment Lounge.
The event is also co-sponsored by the Society of Professional Journalists' D.C. Professional Chapter.
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Read More… from D.C. Government Transparency to be Explored at Sunshine Week Event
Sunshine Week, a push for transparency in government, is drawing to a close. And that's why we choose to highlight it at its end.
The demand for open government must not be reserved to a limited time frame. Indeed, it must be an all-day, every day effort — and not just on the part of media, though we are the ones who champion it.
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Read More… from Editorial: No time limits on call for open government
As part of national Sunshine Week, members of the Madison student and professional chapters of the Society of Professional Journalists fanned out across the capital city, handing out fortune cookies.
We dropped a handful in the offices of elected officials, from the Madison School Board to Gov. Scott Walker, as well as to some unelected boards such as the University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents.
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Read More… from Opinion: Student Journalists Prod officials about open government
You know Sunshine Week is here by the obligatory blitz of editorials in newspapers owned by companies that spend loftily on corporate digs and six-figure bonuses for their executives.
They do this while mostly ignoring the need for taking government to task – and court – for its glaring disregard for conducting business in the open.
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Read More… from Editorial: Citizen activists deserve most credit for forcing open government
If you’ve been watching what goes on in Washington and some statehouses across the country, you might wonder if there’s any issue that everyone should be able to agree on whether they are conservative or liberal or libertarian, Democrat or Republican, pro-this or anti-that.
There is: It’s the need for transparency in all levels of government.
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Read More… from Access to information should be a common goal
To mark Sunshine Week, March 16-22, the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press explains how journalists can use information access laws to develop stories in the public interest. This post is written by Emily Grannis, the Jack Nelson FOI Legal Fellow at the RCFP.
Freedom of information laws are invaluable resources to reporters covering any beat. The laws provide access to a wide range of government documents, from budgets to emails, and contracts to crime reports.
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Read More… from How to use FOIA laws to find stories, deepen sourcing
What’s Sunshine Week, you ask?
The journalism associations behind the mid-March event describe Sunshine Week as “a national initiative to promote a dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information.” Sunshine is shorthand for the open-meetings and open-records laws that guarantee a governing body is operating in the open.
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Read More… from Editorial: Alabama jumped the gun on Sunshine Week. And that’s just fine by me.
The National Press Club, as part of its participation in Sunshine Week, is hosting a panel discussion the evening of Wednesday, March 19 at 6:30 p.m. on transparency in the District of Columbia.
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Read More… from National Press Club to Host D.C. Open Government Coalition Forum
