India: A unique monument celebrating the RTI Act has been installed in the Beawar town of Rajasthan, where the RTI movement had started 20 years ago, according to articles in The Hindu (good photo of memorial), The Times of India and The Hindustan Times. Susheela Singh of Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sanghatan (MKSS) said at a ceremony, “We might now be an independent country, but we must remember that we will still not get our rights if we do not fight for them.” TRTI campaigner Aruna Roy, read out a long list of names of people associated with the movement.
European Union: Alleged lack of transparency continued to be the top issue brought to the attention of the European Ombudsman, accounting for 22.4% of complaints in 2015, according to her annual report.
India: The Delhi high court upholds a Central Information Commission order that all laws enacted and amended by parliament be posted online, according to a story in The Wire.
India: “In a first of its kind, the home department led by chief minister Devendra Fadanvis has paid Rs 10 lakh to an RTI activist as interim compensation for failing to protect him from a violent attack,” The Times of India reports.
New Zealand: The ombudsman issues a guide to the public interest test in section 9(1) of the OIA and section 7(1) of the LGOIMA.
United Kingdom: The Campaign for Freedom of Information proposes to close a FOI loophole concerning the contracting out of public authority functions with a Freedom of Information (Contractor) Bill 2016.
United Kingdom: A consultation ends on the future of the Land Registry, The Guardian reports. Among those commenting on the possible privatization of the registry is the Open Data Institute.
Bangladesh: A variety of factors keep women from utilizing the RTI Act, according to a report (not yet available online) conducted by the Carter Center and Manusher Jonno Foundation, described in The Daily Star and Asia News.
United States: “A court has ordered freedom of information platform MuckRock to remove documents obtained by a public records access request,” reports Motherboard. MuckRock has complied with the request pending a legal challenge.
United States: The Massachusetts legislature approves amendments to the pubic records law, The Boston Herald reports.
Mexico: Technical troubles beset a new National Platform for Transparency, Sineembargo reports (in Spanish).
OpenData/United Kingdom: A blog post by Derek du Preez says “the British government is still not doing enough to strengthen the UK’s data infrastructure and maximise the benefits of open data.”
Open Data: A promotional slideshow from the Open Data Institute and a video, too.
Transparency Research: The Journal of Information Rights, Policy and Practice is a new open access, peer reviewed online journal launched in April. The journal aims to encourage interdisciplinary debate of current information rights issues from a variety of policy, practitioner and academic perspectives.
United States: Ricardo Lara, the chair of the California’s Senate’s appropriations committee, effectively kills SB 1286, a bill that would have shone light on how departments handle confirmed instances of officer misconduct and serious uses of force. The ACLU says a “blue code of silence to remain under California law,” according to an article in The Davis Vanguard.
Tennis Transparency: “David Haggerty Leads International Tennis Federation Toward Greater Transparency,” according to The New York Times.
Open Recipes: After The BBC announced that it will mothball its database of over 11,000 recipes to save money, Andy Dickenson, an “Online Journalism Lecturer and geek,” says the database should be made open.
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