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Call for articles for DttP

Hi all. I'm forwarding this announcement for article submissions to Documents to the People (DttP), the official journal of the Government Documents Round Table (GODORT). I hope you'll consider submitting an article! (Editor's note: I'm currently the chair of the GODORT Publications Committee, which has oversight of the DttP editorial staff. However, there is no relationship between FGI and GODORT.)

Announcement: The editors of Documents to the People (DttP) announce a call for proposals for the Fall 2009 issue. DttP: Documents to the People is the official publication of the Government Documents Round Table (GODORT) of the American Library Association (ALA). DttP features articles on local, state, national, and international government information, government activities, and documents the professional activities of GODORT. All topics relevant to the mission of the journal and GODORT are welcome. Brief proposals of 250-500 words are due by March 1, 2009. Notifications to authors of acceptance for the Fall 2009 issue will be made by March 15, 2009. Full manuscripts of 2,500-3,000 words are due by July 1, 2009. Style and manuscript information can be found in the DttP instructions for authors Please note that while this is a call for proposals for the Fall 2009 issue, we will use the pool of submissions for content of future issues - particularly Spring and Summer 2010. Please send queries and proposals to one or both of the Dttp co-lead editors: Beth Clausen phone: 847-491-2891 b-clausen AT northwestern DOT edu or Valerie Glenn phone: 205-348-4971 vglenn AT gmail DOT com
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Guide of the Week: Transition to Digital Television

Sad to say, for the second time during this Guide of the Week: Transition Edition, I've come up empty. While the General Accountability Office identified the Transition to Digital Television as one of 13 critical transition issues, there appears to be no librarian-produced guides linked to ALA GODORT Handout Exchange Wiki to inform people about this issue. If you know of one, please post it to the Handout Exchange. As a consolation prize, it turns out that the phrase "Digital Television Transition" is a good way to kick the tires on the public beta of GPO's new FDSys at http://fdsys.gpo.gov. Type in the words without quotes and you'll get 2,654 results. That seems too many to look at once? Then use the "narrow your search" options in the left hand column. You might start with "congressional hearlings (761)" That brings you a new list of "narrow your search" options. From there you might choose "House appropriations committee (81)" After that, try clicking on "see more" under "keywords." Try clicking on "public broadcasting" and you'll find four hearings. The search results contain snippets with your search terms and come from several different congresses. As long as I'm talking about FDSys, I want to say THANKS to GPO for including "find in a library" links that are equal in effectiveness to their "purchase this item" links. Next week I'll be dealing with librarian produced guides relating to "Defense Readiness" So if you have any guides relating to that topic, please try and post them to the Handout Exchange this week. Continue reading

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ALA Midwinter GODORT Update Meeting: “NGOs and Libraries: Why Bother?”

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Guide of the Week: Retirement of the Space Shuttle

President Obama was sworn in on January 20th, but we're still continuing the "75 days until Government Information Liberation" inspired "Guide of the Week: Transition Issues edition until we finish all of the 13 "urgent issues" identified by the GAO. The Government Accountability Office recently identified Retirement of the Space Shuttle as one of 13 urgent issues facing the next President and Congress. Today on Guide of the Week, we'll talk about some librarian produced guides from the ALA GODORT Exchange Wiki that can help inform citizens, Congress and President-Elect Obama on this issue. There appear to be two librarian-produced guides that can provide information about the Space Shuttle and its possible successors:

Bert Chapman's guide offers guidance on how to search for documents in space transportation and provides links to the Congressional committees with oversight over the Shuttle program. He also links to the Space Shuttle mission page and to the NASA History office, which has several overview reports of the development of the Shuttle. The UC Boulder guide is also mostly focused on general space resources, but contains a link to NASA's Technical Reports Server (NTRS) at http://ntrs.nasa.gov/, which contains many current and historical reports on the Space Shuttle and its potential successors. Strangely, it insists on sorting records in ascending date order, so for the most current reports you'll need to sort by date and then go to the end of the list. Next week I'll be dealing with librarian produced guides relating to "Transition to Digital Television" So if you have any guides relating to that topic, please try and post them to the Handout Exchange this week. Continue reading

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Guide of the Week: Surface Transportation

Note: In three days, President Elect Obama will officially become our 44th President. On John Shuler's calendar, it will be day zero for government information liberation. While I'll drink a toast that day as soon as I'm off duty, the "Transition edition" of Guide of the Week will continue until we finish off GAO's 13 critical issues on February 7, 2009. The Government Accountability Office recently identified surface transportation as one of 13 urgent issues facing the next President and Congress. Today on Guide of the Week, we'll talk about some librarian produced guides from the ALA GODORT Exchange Wiki that can help inform citizens, Congress and President-Elect Obama on this issue. There are three librarian produced guides on the Handout Exchange which look useful:

Railroads are an important part of our surface transportation system and Bert Chapman's railroad guide provides rich historical context and current resources for statistics and regulations. His more general transportation guide highlights a number of useful resources including the 2002 Census of Transportation & Warehousing, Public roads: A journal of highway research, Senate Commerce, Science, & Transportation Committee, House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee, and my favorite, the Transportation Acronym Guide. Sally Lawler's guide is more historical in nature, but offers ways to explore what we as a nation have wanted from our transportation and how we can plan that transportation in ways that benefit everyone. Here's an example of the type of questions this guide might be able to help you answer:
Can you take a bus to Detroit Metro Airport? to downtown Detroit? Can you commute to work on Amtrak? Get around the city and suburbs on a mass transit system? In contrast, think about the number of highways in and around Detroit and the amount of time news channels spend on traffic reports.
While not part of the Handout Exchange Wiki, people interested in surface transportation issues should also check out state transportation department databases linked from another ALA GODORT project, State Agency Databases Across the Fifty States. Some of the available databases include:
  • California - Caltrans Cost Data - This database contains cost data at the bid item level for contracts from 1993 to the present, and is updated approximately every other week. From 2002 to present, the data includes bid data from non-awarded bidders as well. Search is by item code/description, bidder, district/county, year, price and quantity.
  • Colorado - Transportation Statistics and Data - "Information is provided on current and projected traffic volumes, state highway attributes, summary roadway statistics, demographics and geographic data. Listings, calculators, GIS shape files, maps and database files are provided to access data that are used and maintained by CDOT."
  • Iowa - Bridges in Iowa - Requires Google Earth. From the website, "To provide increased access to bridge information, the Iowa DOT has developed a Web program that allows Iowans to pinpoint a state highway bridge in their area using Google Earth software and Iowa DOT data. Information available online now includes the year a bridge was originally constructed and reconstructed, if it has undergone major work, the average daily traffic count, the highway it carries and feature crossed, and its national bridge sufficiency rating."
  • Ohio - Bridge Photos - Access photos of Ohio bridges by county.
There are more. Just go to the State Agency Databases Across the Fifty States and search on the word transportation. Next week I'll be dealing with librarian produced guides relating to "retirement of the Space Shuttle" So if you have any guides relating to that topic, please try and post them to the Handout Exchange this week. Continue reading

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