Research/United States: Margaret B. Kwoka of the University of Denver Law School publishes research critical of the commercial use of FOIA, drawing on original datasets from six federal agencies. The abstract says:
It uses these agencies as case studies to examine the way that businesses derive profit-making value from free or low-cost federal records. Remarkably, these datasets also reveal a cottage industry of companies whose entire business model is to request federal records under FOIA and resell them at a profit. Information resellers are not isolated occurrences, but rather are some of the most frequent FOIA requesters — often submitting hundreds or even thousands of requests a year — at a variety of federal agencies.
Commercial users certainly have legitimate information needs, but, as this Article demonstrates, the volume and character of the current commercial use of FOIA undermines its efficacy as a transparency tool. Private businesses in essence receive a substantial subsidy without any corresponding public good, all while draining agency resources that might otherwise be used to respond to FOIA requests that serve its central oversight and accountability aims. Moreover, information resellers have become the de facto locus for federal records for whole industries, effectively privatizing an important public function.
Counter-intuitively, limiting commercial requesting will not solve this problem. Instead, this Article proposes a targeted and aggressive policy of requiring government agencies to affirmatively disclose sets of records that are routinely the subject of FOIA requests — a surprisingly large number of the documents sought by commercial requesters. By meeting information needs in a more efficient manner that is available equally to all, affirmative disclosure will enable federal agencies to reclaim public records from the private market and free up resources to better serve FOIA requests that advance its democratic purpose.
India: The Supreme Court orders the central government to fill three vacant posts at the Central Information Commission within six weeks, according to an article in Livemint.
Open Data: A draft open data policy for Washington, D.C., includes a provision mandating “a means for the public to submit and track Freedom of Information Act requests online” and also lays out proactive disclosure requirements, including the posting of “frequently requested” information.
Open Data: A blog post by Peter Wells of the Open Data Institute in the UK asks “What would legislation for data infrastructure and open data look like?” Wells suggests among other things that such legislation would “designate a particular dataset as being a data infrastructure asset, including some as open data.” Comments are invited.
Open Parliaments: The Legislative Openness Data Explorer provides global, comparative information on parliamentary openness in 31 countries. More about it at OpeningParliament.org.
OGP: See a list of countries making new plans here. Also, a new list of contact details for national government OGP coordinators, along with the staff leads from the Support Unit in the Civil Society Engagement team and the Government Support and Exchange team.
Charities/UK: A commentary by John Tizzard in the Huff Post is titled, “Charities Must Be Transparent But Must Retain Independence – Freedom of Information Only for Public Contracts.”
Liberia: A new FOI request website has been launches in Liberia “hoping for success despite the fact that many in the country have little or no access to the internet,” says a My Society announcement. “If the idea of running an email-based requesting system under such circumstances sounds slightly ambitious, read on to see just how iLab Liberia will make it work, in collaboration with the Liberia Freedom of Information Coalition, and funded by the Making All Voices Count project.”
Chile: “Open Government and transparency reform in Chile. Balancing Leadership, ambition and implementation capacity,” a report by Aránzazu Guillán Montero, a senior advisor at U4, a resource center for development practitioners who wish to effectively address corruption challenges. The report has many dimensions, including a look at municipal use of a Transparency Portal.
Uruguay: “Open Government in Uruguay,” another U4 report by Montero, concludes: “However, the open government commitments have yet failed to articulate an integral transparency policy that addresses the constraints of the existing access to information law. These limitations result from the complex institutional framework of transparency in Uruguay, resource constraints, and the limits of civil society to engage with the government in a balanced partnership.”
Denmark: Investigative reporters at Information continue (in Danish) their investigative journalism about the FOI law (offentlighedslov) this time going into detail on the kinds of documents being withheld through the ministerial exemption.
Transparency Research: The 5th Global Conference on Transparency Research will be held at the University of Limerick, Ireland, June 19-21, 2017. The sixth will be in Rio de Janeiro in June of 2018. The 2017 conference is being jointly organized by the University of Limerick and the University of Baltimore in the USA, in association with the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania and Makarere University in Uganda. Dr. Heather Wyatt-Nichol, University of Baltimore hwyatt-nichol@ubalt.edu <mailto:hwyatt-nichol@ubalt.edu> and Dr. Chris McInerney, University of Limerick chris.g.mcinerney@ul.ie <mailto:chris.g.mcinerney@ul.ie> For more information on the planning of the 2018 conference contact Dr. Greg Michener at gregory.michener@fgv.br <mailto:gregory.michener@fgv.br> (See FreedomInfo.org report on the 4th conference in 2015.)
Pakistan: Citizens for a Better Environment, under the banner of “Citizens’ Voice for strengthening Transparency and Accountability Mechanism,” organized a meeting of officials and others to stress the need to enact an effective RTI law in Sindh, the Daily Times reports.
Jersey: Jersey’s government announces plans to expand its FOI law to include more public bodies, including Jersey Telecoms, says .
Employment: The Global Access to Information Program at the Carter Center is looking for a Senior Program Associate.
United States: John Dyer writes in Niewman Reports, “Fifty Years of FOIA.” The subhead says, “As the Freedom of Information Act turns 50, journalists are innovating new ways to use the law.”
India: RTI activists are up in arms against the Uttar Pradesh rules to implement the RTI law, The Times of India reports.
Georgia: The Parliament of Georgia has established a Permanent Council on Open and Transparent Governance. Also to be created is a Consultative Group, to be comprised by the representatives of the nongovernmental and organizations. The Council is a permanent official part of the legislative body of Georgia.
Japan: “The Cabinet Secretariat has urged government agencies to make information designated as secret under the controversial state secrecy law accessible to Japan’s Board of Audit if so requested, a government source said Tuesday,” according to an article in the Japan Times.
United States: Freedom of information is under siege in Tennessee and the Us, according to a commentary by Michael A. Anastasi, Vice President / News and Executive Editor of The Tennessean, and a board member of the Associated Press Media Editors and chair of its First Amendment Committee.
IFTI Watch/UNDP: The UN Development Programme in late 2015 updated its Information Disclosure Policy with regards to Section V, dealing with our Information Disclosure Oversight Panel. “The composition of the panel is now such that UNDP no longer has a majority of its membership, or votes (see Section V.21), thereby significantly strengthening the panel’s independence,” according to a UNDP official. He continued: “In addition, the two UNDP panel members are now required to be staff of UNDPs’ Ethics Office and Office of Audit and Investigations. We believe these are significant changes that are more in line with international best practices.”
United States: New Jersey’s Department of Agriculture refuses to release the results of a necropsy performed on a dolphin citing medical privacy, according to media reports.
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