FOIA Threat in Farm Bill, Act Now
None of us can keep track of everything by ourselves. It takes a community to maintain vigilence about creeping secrecy. So a HUGE tip of the FGI hat to Ian Campbell of The Gov Doc for bringing this item about an effort to gnaw at the Federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) via the federal farm bill, of all things:
If you toil in the fields of government information, you may be interested to know that an urgent campaign is underway to strike language from the Senate version of the Farm Bill which would create a substantial new FOIA exemption and severely restrict public access to important information about farm animal health under a National Animal Identification System (NAIS).
OpenTheGovernment.org has written a letter to Senators expressing opposition to the non-disclosure language in the Senate version of the bill, and the American Library Association, Special Libraries Association, and American Association of Law Libraries are among the 28 organizations to sign on. Please see the letter at:
http://www.openthegovernment.org/otg/farm_bill_letter.pdf
As the letter states, Section 10305 of the Livestock Title of the Farm Bill approved October 25 by the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee gives the Secretary of Agriculture broad authority to restrict and control disclosure of NAIS information, and imposes "disproportionately harsh penalties for press activities protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution." The letter seeks to strike Section 10305 from the bill.
Thanks for the heads up Ian!
Continue readingChipping Away at FOI in WV
A story in the Intelligencer, Wheeling News Register, Public Shut Out of Records, published November 4, 2007, details how West Virginia's public records law has not aged very well:
West Virginia’s FOIA law originally only contained eight reasons why a government agency could withhold information from the public. These exemptions mirrored several in the open meetings law, and also covered such areas as trade secrets, internal documents and “test questions, scoring keys and other examination data” used by schools and licensing agencies.
But the number of exemptions doubled in 2003 as lawmakers sought to protect “information that could be used in a terrorist act that would have a detrimental effect on public safety or public health.”
“The reaction to 9/11, and perhaps the reaction to identity theft, seem to be more of a knee-jerk reaction,” said Patrick McGinley, a West Virginia University law professor who has helped state residents pursue FOIA requests in court. “The question in those cases really ought to be, is there a compelling reason to make these things secret.”
One of the original eight exemptions shields “information specifically exempted from disclosure by statute.”
Armed with that provision, legislators have peppered other sections of state code with 68 additional exemptions, the AP’s review shows.
This commentary on West Virginia was part of a 50-state study conducted in part by the National Freedom of Information Coalition. They found sad results nationwide:
Better Government Association and National Freedom of Information Coalition give 38 out of 50 states "F" grade in overall responses to FOI requests. Read more here.
America deserves better.
Continue readingState Blue Books – ALA GODORT – Accept no substitutes
I need the help of the FGI community in a strange way. I need you to link to the now official copy of the State Blue Book guide I originally created in 2005 and updated with great assistance from Jennifer Manning of the Library of Congress.
That link is http://wikis.ala.org/godort/index.php/State_Blue_Books. Please post it whereever you can.
Why? Because if you do a Google or Yahoo search on the term "state blue books", the page that comes up isn't the one hosted by ALA GODORT and patrolled by several eagle-eyed sysops (Hi James R!), but the former well-meaning host. I haven't actively looked at old page for over a year.
And that was a mistake. Ugly spammers got to the former page from the history, it looks like they've been there awhile. I had forgottened to watch the page and only found out the problem because of someone who had been planning to show off the page as an example collaboration, but thought twice. Then I realized that I hadn't updated my personal web page to reflect the shift to GODORT, so not only were the search engines going to an outdated page, *I* was telling people to go to an outdated page.
No more. I have redirected my links to http://wikis.ala.org/godort/index.php/State_Blue_Books. If you've got a link to my guide, please update your link. And if enough of us do that, the search engines will direct to the page where we've got the guide's back.
And accept my apologies for not updating the community sooner.
Continue readingGAO Employees Speak Out on Need for Union
I think this video makes a good companion piece to the last GAO video I blogged about. I found this video on YouTube and it appears to have been made by a group of GAO analysts trying to form a union on their workplace. It introduces a number of people who appear to be actual GAO employees. It is about seven minutes long and is interesting for giving voice to the people behind the reports that often get so much press coverage. The video is also notable for its positive, non-hostile tone.
I'm not positive that the unofficial union blog at http://gaounion.net is connected to the producers of the video, but it goes give good background about why GAO analysts are seeking to unionize and provides the latest news on that effort. Part of that news is that on September 19, 2007, GAO analysts voted 2 to 1 to form a union. FGI wishes them well in their efforts and hopes that a unionized work force will contribute to government accountability.
Continue readingDepository Librarians Group in Facebook
Librarians from the Federal Depository Library Program are showing up in many online places. Now there is a group on Facebook for them. It's a pretty quiet group so far, but it is another forum for librarians to gather and share their experiences and maybe reach out to users in creative ways. If you work in a depository library and have a Facebook account, please consider joining. Thanks to Kathryn Mills of DePauw for taking a chance and creating this group.
And if you're not a depository librarian, but are a Facebook member interested in government information of all kinds, there's a group for you too!
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