FOI Blog

When I get together with my counterparts in other states — such as the Florida First Amendment Foundation, Open Oregon, the New England First Amendment Coalition, or the Ohio Coalition for Open Government — I often imagine us as residents of a nursing home sharing our ailments. We nod and tsk-tsk as we exchange tales…

By Shelley Kimball Time. In the world of public records requests, this can be an obstacle both to the requester and the records custodian. And this is not just an issue in the Commonwealth of Virginia. I have been conducting research on the interactions between requesters and custodians for years. One constant complaint from records…

By Megan Rhyne   (This is the second in a two-part series on tracking proposed legislation. Read the first part here.)   For my last blog entry I wrote about how you at home can watch the legislative process unfold: how the committee system is structured, how a committee meeting works, how to watch the…

By Megan Rhyne (This is the first in a two-part series on tracking proposed legislation. Find the second part here.) As the “oldest continuous law-making body in the New World,” the Virginia General Assembly is steeped in history and tradition. That tradition is awe-inspiring on the one hand, while on the other hand, it can…

By Jeff South Overcoming recalcitrant bureaucrats isn’t the only challenge for people who seek public documents or data under the Freedom of Information Act. Another challenge is managing your paperwork: crafting and filing your FOIA requests and tracking responses. Fortunately, a bevy of online tools is available to help you with those tasks. Here is…

By Dave Ress For the record (as we like to say). We call it the Freedom of Information Act in Virginia, but it’s good to remember that it’s about information that’s in a public record or revealed in a public meeting. One thing that can really help get information, as Cherise Newsome points out in…

Once again, a court has looked at an isolated provision of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and decided that it means something completely different from what had been commonly accepted in the past.   This time a circuit court judge in Henrico County has held that state senators (and presumably, by extension, delegates)…

By Shelley Kimball There are certain kinds of requests for records that access professionals hate so much they wish they could find ways to outlaw them. Requests that frustrate them so much they wish they didn’t have to respond to them. Let’s call them nuisance requests. We know that citizens are routinely blocked from access…

By Cherise Newsome There are two sides to every FOIA request. I’ve seen them both. As the public information officer for Portsmouth Public Schools, I serve as our FOIA compliance officer. Therefore, I manage the requests that come into the school division. I’ve been here about six months, and I’ve logged more than 50 requests…

Join in the discussion with Virginia’s Freedom of Information Advisory Council to determine how to define which business records may be blocked from public access. The meeting, which is open to all, is Monday, May 15, in the Virginia State Capitol.

Anyone who has requested public records regulalry has faced denials from government offices. An open government activist discusses how best to manage and respond to denials.

Education privacy laws, while intended as protections for students’ records, are being used by institutions to conceal wrongdoing and mismanagement.

In the latest installment of Truth in the Field, a veteran journalist explains the basics of how to use Virginina’s Freedom of Information Act and where to go for help

Welcome to VCOG new blog, Truth in the Field, a series of columns that explain how journalists, citizens, academics, and activists have accessed and used government information.

What a difference a year makes.   Last year, a Senate subcommittee on FOIA advanced one bill after another that restricted the public’s access to government information. It recommended a bill to exempt police names, one to limit which state salaries could be released and in what format, and one that created a month-long procedural…

The Virginia Coalition for Open Government is pleased to announce the winners of its 2016 open government awards. The awards are given to individuals or organizations who have made use of public information laws to keep government accountable and to inform their fellow citizens.   Professor Marc Edwards from Virginia Tech is this year’s Laurence…

I don’t usually repost full copies of news stories, but this one is especially noteworthy as a snapshot of how FOIA transactions can unspool. This is a reporter trying to get a state agency report, but the same back and forth, same push and pull, can be experienced by requesters at all levels of government…

This commentary originally appeared in The Roanoke Times, September 18, 2016   Megan Rhyne | Rhyne is executive director of the Virginia Coalition For Open Government and can be reached at 540-353-8264 or mrhyne@opengovva.org Back in May 1995, the director of the Virginia Press Association, Ginger Stanley, reported to the VPA board of directors that the…

VCOG has submitted a letter — co-signed with the DC Open Government Coalition and the Maryland-Deleware-DC Press Association — urging lawmakers in each jurisdiction to include specific transparency measures in their proposals to create the Metrorail Safety Commission for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority to oversee the Metro system. Read the letter here: