Sunshine Week 2010 Wrap-up

At the start of Sunshine Week, the National Security Archive (NSA) at George Washington University released an audit of the Obama Administration’s handling of Freedom of Information Act requests over the past year.  The audit found that agencies lagged in meeting the goals set by President Obama in his Open Government Directive. The NSA gave the government an “A” for effort but and “Incomplete” for results. In its coverage of the FOIA issue, the Washington Post has been critical of the Administration’s progress toward more open, transparent government as well.

The Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy has called on governments to define public information as broadly as possible, with only very narrow, specific exemptions.  The Knight Commission focused its recommendation on government transparency in the digital age broadly, calling on government at all levels to operate transparently, facilitate easy and low-cost access to public records, and make civic and social data available in standardized formats that support the productive public use of such data.

Without specifically addressing the FOIA, the Commission concluded that the following actions are warranted to move governments toward greater openness:

Federal, state and local jurisdictions should clearly identify and train employees responsible for handling public record requests. Laws should penalize government agencies and their employees who violate their own public information rules. Openness requirements should apply to all public bodies and government contractors. Finally, governments should provide for independent oversight of their transparency efforts.

We wrap up observance of the sixth annual Sunshine in Government Week with a brief observation by Scott Hodes at the FOIA Blog on the cultural sea-change that needs to occur in government in order to achieve the openness and transparency to which we aspire.

Let me put this all into context.  Just because the President and the Attorney General issue directives, they are not actually processing FOIA requests.  And until the civil service laws change, the President and the Attorney General can’t just fire those employees who don’t follow through on the directives, or like the folks at CBP [Customs and Border Patrol], sit on a request for four years and then come up with another delaying tactic.  The federal government is a big ship, that for FOIA purposes, was ignored for eight years prior to January of 2009.  It will take time to right the ship–as well as money, which no one has.  So, while criticism is warranted, patience is also needed to fix these problems.

It all comes down to one simple values proposition: The public’s business should be done in public.