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Free Government Information (FGI) is a place for initiating dialogue and building consensus among the various players (libraries, government agencies, non-profit organizations, researchers, journalists, etc.) who have a stake in the preservation of and perpetual free access to government information. FGI promotes free government information through collaboration, education, advocacy and research.

More information on shutdowns of federal websites

Informative, but non-essential websites are likely candidates for being shut down. White House says critical websites won't be affected by shutdown, By William Matthews, Next Gov (04/07/2011).

In the event of a government shutdown, federal websites "would remain operational" if they are deemed "necessary to avoid significant damage to the execution of authorized or accepted activities," a White House official told Nextgov in an email message late Wednesday. ...For the duration of a shutdown, agency-operated websites that are not judged to be critical "would not remain active," the official said. That doesn't mean they will necessarily vanish from the Internet. Rather, if they remain available, the information on them might not be up to date, and transactions submitted to agencies through the sites might not be processed until the shutdown ends... Sites to be closed include the International Trade Administration, the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the Economics and Statistics Administration, the and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. ...Informative, but non-essential websites, such as USASpending.gov, ITDashboard.gov and Data.gov are likely candidates for being shut down... ...Agencies are expected to post notices on their Web home pages about which online features will work and which won't during the shutdown.
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Federal websites may go dark if shutdown occurs

Declan McCullagh at CNET reports that many federal Web sites will likely go offline if the government shuts down Friday night. "A 16-page memo (PDF) to federal agencies says their Web sites may stay online only in a small number of situations, including tax collection and handling 'exempted' activities such as payments and other functions that are paid for by previous annual budgets." So how will permanent public access be maintained in the event of a shutdown? Will the standard notice include information on how to find your local federal depository library? The public won't even be able to find a list of depository libraries on the FDLP desktop (fdlp.gov) but will have to go to Documents Data Miner hosted by the library at Wichita State University. The Washington Post has a list of govt agency shutdown plan details -- including GPO -- but only states, "If the government were to shut down, a [GPO] skeleton staff is expected to stay on to print copies of the Congressional Record and other White House documents." It's unclear whether or not fdlp.gov, fdsys.gov or other GPO sites will remain online in the event of a shutdown.

"The mere benefit of continued access by the public to information about the agency's activities would not warrant the retention of personnel or the obligation of funds to maintain, or update, the agency's Web site" during a shutdown, says the memo, prepared by the White House's Office of Management and Budget. It adds: "If an agency's Web site is shut down, users should be directed to a standard notice that the Web site is unavailable during the period of government shutdown." The IRS's Web site would likely stay online, the memo says, because tax collection is an exempted activity, "but the entire Treasury Department Web site would not."
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Needs Work: Congressional Record Printing Savings Act of 2011

As part of the search to save federal dollars, Senator Tom Coburn has introduced S 674, the Congressional Record Printing Savings Act of 2011. This act may save up to $8 million a year by reducing "unnecessary" printing of the Congressional Record. You can find the text through Open Congress. We at FGI are not opposed in principle to printing fewer copies of government publications as long as permanant public access and preservation issues are adequately addressed. We don't believe this particular bill does so. We see three main problems with the "Congressional Record Printing Savings Act of 2011":

  1. The bill only gives gpo 45 days to determine the appropriate number of printed archival copies. - There is little published research on the appropriate number of printed copies for preservation purposes, and most of the available research deals with periodicals. Some original research needs to be done specifically for government publications and this couldn't be completed in 45 days.
  2. The bill is silent on where these copies should be stored. - This legislation directs GPO to determine a number of preservation copies, but doesn't state where these copies would be stored. Will the copies provided to Congress count? Will geographic distribution be taken into account? Will some be mandated to be stored in libraries? We the public don't know and we should before accepting a diminished number of copies.
  3. It misses an opportunity to deposit the electronic CR to depository libraries as an additional anti-tampering safeguard. - If the printed copy of the Congressional Record is going to be diminished, then assuring the authencity and permanent public access to the electronic Congressional Record will gain in importance. Keeping multiple electronic copies in non-federal hands would be an important safeguard against future alterations of the Congressional Record and ought to be considered by Congress.
If the Congressional Record is an interest of yours and you agree with our concerns, consider contacting your Members of Congress. Continue reading

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Live blogging Depository Library Conference Spring 2011 #dlc11s

We'll be live blogging once again at the Spring 2011 Depository Library Conference from San Antonio, TX. With a new Public Printer and Superintendent of Documents, the discussions are sure to be interesting. The 3 plenary sessions will be especially interesting and include discussions on PACER, future needs and goals of the FDLP and a weds morning session on permanent public access to digital material with a panel from HathiTrust, Internet Archive, GPO staff and Chris Brown. The twitter hashtag #dlc11s and #dlc11 will show up in the live blog so we hope many of the attendees will tweet their thoughts and comments. Twapper Keeper now has a subscription model, so the only archive of tweets will be the live blog. If anyone would like to volunteer to be a DLC reporter and use CoverItLive to track the conference, please contact me ASAP at freegovinfo AT gmail DOT com.

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New Depository Library Councilors named

Congratulations to Stephanie Braunstein, Donna Lauffer, Susan Lyons, Mark Phillips, and Arlene Weible on being named to serve on the Depository Library Council! Here's the GPO press release:

Public Printer Bill Boarman announced his appointments to the Depository Library Council (DLC) by saying, "I am honored to appoint these talented individuals to the Council and look forward to their advice on how to advance the mission of the FDLP. GPO has a strong partnership with the depository library community, which is also the foundation of GPO's mission in disseminating Government documents and information to the public." The five new DLC members (who will serve from June 1, 2011 through June 1, 2014) are: * Stephanie Braunstein, Assistant Librarian at the Troy H. Middleton Library at the Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, one of Louisiana's two regional libraries. Braunstein's outreach with the library community includes presenting at conferences, partnering with GPO to host an online list of Federal agency web sites, and contributing to Browse Topics, an online subject based portal for government information. She currently serves as Coordinator of the Federal Documents Task Force (FDTF) of the American Library Association (ALA) and is the Louisiana Library Association Councilor to ALA. * Donna Lauffer, County Librarian for the Johnson County Library system's 13 branches in Overland Park, Kansas. Lauffer has a strong track record in delivering government information to the public and in promoting civic engagement. Her leadership in support of government information and relevant programming in her library system led to the Johnson County Library being honored as the 2010 Federal Depository Library of the Year. * Susan Lyons, Reference and Government Documents Librarian at the Rutgers University Law School Library in Newark, New Jersey. Lyons' professional interests include digital preservation, authentication, and permanent public access to government information. She has served as Chair of the Government Documents Special Interest Section of the American Association of Law Librarians (AALL), President of the New Jersey Law Librarians Association, and President of the Documents Association of New Jersey. * Mark Phillips, Assistant Dean for Digital Libraries at the University of North Texas in Denton, Texas. Phillips specializes in digital collections, knowledge of infrastructure for digital collections, preservation techniques, and web harvesting. He currently serves on the Access Committee in the International Internet Preservation Consortium (IIPC) and the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative's, Dublin Core Library Profile Workgroup. * Arlene Weible, Government Documents and Technical Services Librarian at the Oregon State Library in Salem, Oregon. Weible has a broad background in technical services and public services, and experience working in state and academic libraries. She currently serves on the National Digital Stewardship Alliance and the regional coordinator for Oregon's intrastate shared regional, a successful shared housing arrangement that serves the depository libraries in Oregon. The DLC consists of fifteen members appointed by the Public Printer. Its mission is to assist the U.S. Government Printing Office in identifying and evaluating alternatives for improving public access to Government information through the Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP) and for optimizing resources available for operating the Program. Members serve three year terms, with five members retiring each year and five new members entering. At least half of the Council's members work in depository libraries and have experience in a Documents department.
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