The Northern Virginia Regional Commission unanimously appointed Craig T. Fifer its next executive director at a special meeting Tuesday. Fifer will succeed Robert W. Lazaro Jr., who is retiring from the commission Aug. 31. Fifer’s previous work includes director of intergovernmental affairs for the governor of Virginia, senior advisor to the commissioner of the Virginia Department of Social Services and director of communications and public information for the city of Alexandria, where he worked for 18 years, according to a news release announcing the appointment. NOTE: Fifer is a one-time VCOG board of directors president, the current acting vice president, and has served on the board for nearly 20 years.
The Department of Energy (DOE) said in a public notice scheduled to be published Thursday that it will throw out all Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests sent to the agency before October 1, 2024 unless the requester proactively emails the agency to tell it they are still interested in the documents they requested. This will result in the improper closure of likely thousands of FOIA requests if not more; government transparency experts told 404 Media that the move is “insane,” “ludicrous,” a “Pandora’s Box,” and “an underhanded attempt to close out as many FOIA requests as possible.” The DOE notice says “requesters who submitted a FOIA request to DOE HQ at any time prior to October 1, 2024 (FY25), that is still open and is not under active litigation with DOE (or another Federal agency) shall email StillInterestedFOIA@hq.doe.gov to continue processing of the FOIA request […] If DOE HQ does not receive a response from requesters within the 30-day time-period with a DOE control number, no further action will be taken on the open FOIA request(s), and the file may be administratively closed.” A note at the top of the notice says it is scheduled to be formally published in the Federal Register on Thursday.
A couple of months ago at a social gathering we had the opportunity to spend some time with a person who has dedicated his life to developing and advocating for laws intended to alleviate a variety of social ills. The conversation was fun for us (it’s rare that we can get anyone at a party to talk about government policy and not politics), but then there came a point when our new acquaintance made it clear how much trouble he had with the influence that performance measurement and an overwhelming data focus had on the direction of policies. His sense was that a myopic statistical focus — like the attention paid to standardized tests in education — was problematic, particularly given cultural biases. We fully understand the point our acquaintance made, but worry about what we see as a growing inclination to distrust or dismiss data when it potentially disrupts policy or political plans. If data doesn’t conform with expectations, further analysis is always welcome to determine why. But to ignore the message, bury it out of public view or reject it out of hand only undermines the effort to see what’s really working in government and what’s not.
