From The National Academies:
To strengthen the essential role that science and technology play in maintaining national and economic security, the United States should ensure the open exchange of unclassified research despite the small risk that it could be misused for harm by terrorists or rogue nations, says a new report by the National Research Council. [...]
Archive of entries posted on October 2007
To Maintain National Security, U.S. Policies Should Continue To Promote Open Exchange Of Research
White House to divulge surveillance papers to Senate Judiciary panel leaders
From The Hill:
The White House will allow leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee to access documents on the Bush administration’s secret spying program, in an effort to win their support for retroactive legal protections covering the telecommunications firms that participated in the program, Democrats said Thursday.
UK: Government commissions a review of access to historical records
From the UK National Archives:
The Prime Minister announced on 25 October that he has commissioned a review of when historical records are transferred to The National Archives and largely opened to public access. This currently happens 30 years after an event, and the Prime Minister’s review will look at whether this period should be reduced…
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California Restores TRI Reporting for the State
From OMB Watch:
When California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) signed the California Toxic Release Inventory Act of 2007 (Assembly Bill 833) into law on Oct. 13, California became the first state to pass legislation to undo the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) December 2006 weakening of the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI). The new state law establishes [...]
Transparency in the Election Spotlight
From OMB Watch:
Popular thinking tells us that for any trend, fad or heavily pursued activity, the pendulum will eventually swing back the other way. As we approach the 2008 elections, this may well be the case for government transparency, which, after years of increasing government secrecy, appears to be getting greater attention than ever before.
U.S. panel endorses bill to stop online repression
From the Washington Post:
A key congressional panel endorsed legislation on Tuesday that would bar U.S. Internet companies from cooperating with authorities in China and other repressive regimes.
The U.S. House Foreign Relations Committee voted in favor of legislation designed to stop companies such as Yahoo Inc from turning over personal information to governments that use it [...]
Materials Missing At Library of Congress
2 from the Washington Post:
Materials Missing At Library of Congress
About one-sixth of the books, monographs and bound periodicals at the Library of Congress weren’t where they were supposed to be because of flaws in the systems for shelving and retrieving materials, according to a survey to be made public at a congressional hearing today.
Officials at [...]
National Archives and the Genealogical Society of Utah (GSU) Announce Digitizing Partnership
NARA Press Release:
Archivist of the United States Allen Weinstein and Wayne Metcalfe, vice president of the Genealogical Society of Utah, today announced a five-year partnership agreement to digitize case files of approved pension applications of widows of Civil War Union soldiers from the National Archives. GSU has many years of experience microfilming historical records at [...]
Mandate for Public Access to NIH-Funded Research Poised to Become Law
Alliance for Taxpayer Access Press Release:
The U.S. Senate last night approved the FY2008 Labor, HHS, and Education Appropriations Bill (S.1710), including a provision that directs the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to strengthen its Public Access Policy by requiring rather than requesting participation by researchers. The bill will now be reconciled with the House Appropriations [...]
Governmentattic.org Website Launches With FOIA Request Logs for 50 Agencies
Thanks to Bespacific:
governmentattic.org… “rummaging in the government’s attic” launches with the FOIA Logs for 50 federal agencies (in PDF), as well several dozen sets of government documents obtained via FOIA requests. The topical documents range from the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) Standardized Chapel Library Project book list to the US DOJ Federal Bureau of [...]