Virginia has a terrible record when it comes to transparency.
The state got a failing grade for public access for information from the Center for Public Integrity last year, so lawmakers are considering a number of bills to make the government more transparent.
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Read More… from How can Virginia improve poor record on transparency?
Hopewell’s City Council erred last January in discussing electing its leadership behind closed doors, a Circuit Court judge has ruled in what open-government advocates believe to be the first legal test of its kind.
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Brian Davison, a parent in Loudoun County, may be a bit of a gadfly. But he's on point with his insistence that parents have more information about the performance of their public schools.
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Read More… from Editorial: Data on teacher performance in Virginia should be available to the public
Virginia’s public-records panel will explore changes to state law to address the ramifications from a recent state Supreme Court ruling that advocates have warned could have sweeping effects on government transparency.
At a meeting Wednesday, the co-chairman of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act Advisory Council said the body will look into concerns raised by Sen.-elect Scott A. Surovell, D-Fairfax, who took the Department of Corrections to court last year after being denied information about the state’s procedures for carrying out the death penalty.
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Read More… from Virginia FOIA council looks to shore up public-records laws
State officials in Virginia scrambling to keep documents from the press. The governor’s office directing an agency to misrepresent open records laws. Local reporters pushing back at agency flacks about how to interpret those laws. And a response to a big Freedom of Information Act request from a newspaper that exposed how it all went down behind the scenes.
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Read More… from Virginia reporters school state officials on open records laws
Hampton Police launched an "open data portal" that allows anyone to access various types of information on its website.
The portal includes crime statistics, officer-involved shooting information, a community police event calendar, and incident and offense reports. Continue…
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Read More… from Virginia data portal aimed at improving transparency with police, public
Legislation is coming to rework Virginia's Freedom of Information Act in the wake of a state Supreme Court decision that seems to allow government officials to withhold more records from the public.
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Read More… from Legislation expected to address state Supreme Court FOIA ruling
A state panel reviewing Virginia's open records laws recommended narrowing one of the law's most frequently used exemptions Tuesday.
The proposal would not change the Virginia Freedom of Information Act, but would provide clarification in the hopes of preventing the exemption from being used more broadly than intended. Continue>>>
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Read More… from Virginia FOIA committee recommends clarifying ‘working papers’ exemption
Megan Rhyne, executive director of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government, took issue on Friday with the “matters before the public” rules approved by the Board of Supervisors.
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Read More… from Virginia Coalition for Open Government calls board’s new rules “far-reaching”
Governor Terry McAuliffe announced that Virginia state government and the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Business will again work together on data re-engineering internships to explore the use of data to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of state government.
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Read More… from Virginia: Governor McAuliffe announces 2015-16 data internships
