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University Of Virginia vs. State FOIA Law, Again

October 15, 2012 FOIA Illinois 0

Last month, e-mail correspondence between scientists was ruled exempt from the Virginia Freedom of Information Act in a case that pit the right-wing American Tradition Institute against U.Va. climate scientist Michael Mann. Associate Director of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government Megan Rhyne weighs in on another recent FOIA-related standoff at […]

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Obama vs. FOIA?

October 17, 2012 FOIA Illinois 0

An hour before President Obama took to the stage for a second debate with Gov. Mitt Romney that many say he won, the Washington Examiner website published a damning Op-Ed distilling Christopher Horner’s “The Liberal War on Transparency,” which it calls “a 300-plus-page indictment on Obama’s transparency promises, particularly when it comes […]

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University of Illinois Reports Record FOIA Requests

October 29, 2012 FOIA Illinois 0

The University of Illinois has been in the news quite a bit this year, and University officials say all that press is prompting a record number of FOIA inquiries. Officials say they’ve fulfilled a majority of the 520 information requests received through September, reviewing more than 100,000 pages of documents […]

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Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Transparency Project

November 6, 2012 FOIA Illinois 0

The Electronic Frontier Foundation unveiled a new project this week that represents a big step in the right direction for free and open access to public data. The organization’s Transparency Project will include a searchable database of documents it has acquired through Freedom of Information Act requests, and easy-to-follow guides […]

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Free Speech Standoff Continues At NEIU

November 12, 2012 FOIA Illinois 0

Months after Northeastern Illinois University’s student radio station was shut down by administrators in June, the argument continues over the plug was pulled to censor students, or to halt alleged resource mismanagement. That issue came up in a Board of Trustees meeting last week, according to the Chicago Reader, as […]

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Delaware Judge Orders Employee Salaries to be Disclosed

November 16, 2012 FOIA Illinois 0

Transparency victory in Delaware: a county judge ruled Wednesday that a city water authority must fulfill a FOIA request from a town council member to disclose employee salary data. From the Associated Press: After the authority refused to release its records, saying it is not a public body under state […]

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FOIA’d Documents Bring Closure To Family Tragedy

November 20, 2012 FOIA Illinois 0

Joel Campbell of the Salt Lake Tribune brings us a story of one woman who found closure following her grandparents’ mysterious deaths thanks to the Freedom of Information Act. Leslie Randle never trusted the succinct sequence of events provided by military officials  that led to the death of her grandparents, […]

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Remember Your First FOIA?

December 1, 2012 FOIA Illinois 0

Robyn Dexter, a journalism major at Eastern Illinois University, wrote a column for The Daily Eastern reflecting on her first encounter with FOIAs in a Computer-Assisted Reporting class. Her conclusion? Among many other things, we’ve learned that persistence is the ultimate key to acquiring desired information. Amen, sister. [Read the […]