It’s tough to overstate the importance of an informed citizenry.
The more people know, the more power they have to effect change, to hold government and business accountable and to make profound contributions to the free marketplace of ideas.
Two bills before the U.S. House and Senate would strengthen Americans’ access to information. Colorado Sen. Ken Salazar, a Democrat, backs both proposals. Sen. Wayne Allard, a Republican, has yet to weigh in.
The first bill, known as the OPEN Government Act of 2007, stands to be the most significant reform in decades of the federal Freedom of Information Act. FOIA, as it is commonly called, is one of the strongest tools Americans have to supervise the inner workings of government. It allows citizens to review many of the records the feds generate and manage in the public’s name.
The bill is backed by more than 100 organizations and has broad bipartisan support in both chambers. The U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved the measure in March. The U.S. Senate was poised to do the same until Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., placed a secret hold on the bill in late May. The Society of Professional Journalists, the nation’s largest journalism-advocacy organization, exposed Kyl, who essentially has said he’s carrying water for the Justice Department. Bill backers now are leaning on Sens. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., to override Kyl’s hold, force him to debate this issue on the floor and call for a vote.
It’s no surprise that the DOJ opposes the bill. The department often flouts public-information requests and largely gets away with it. According to its own records, the department frequently blows statutory deadlines, which give an agency up to 30 days to respond to a request and up to 30 days to answer an appeal.
Former federal prosecutor Ty Clevenger, like many citizens who request public information, learned all of this the hard way. When he failed to receive records he requested (more than a year later, he’s still waiting, by the way), Clevenger analyzed the DOJ’s compliance with FOIA laws. He found that last year it took the department’s office of public affairs a median of 290 days to process 32 requests categorized as “simple.” The department’s office of legislative affairs processed 15 simple requests in a median of 109 days.
Adding to the problem, Clevenger said, is that the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, an independent agency specifically charged with enforcing FOIA, doesn’t often get around to doing its job – much less publicizing its role. “The [OSC’s] website … says absolutely nothing about its duties to enforce FOIA, and I could not find a single OSC publication that mentioned FOIA, except those that discussed OSC’s own internal compliance – or noncompliance,” Clevenger said.
Since 2003, there is no record of a single FOIA prosecution, Clevenger said. In 2002, the OSC reported that 23 of 3,392 complaints it received concerned FOIA violations but did not indicate whether it actually prosecuted any of those cases. The following year, OSC stopped reporting that data altogether.
The second bill, known as the Free Flow of Information Act of 2007, would create a federal media shield law. The law would let people wanting to speak with journalists in confidence rest easier, knowing that federal prosecutors would have a tougher time compelling journalists to testify about their confidential sources. Currently, 49 states (Wyoming is the only unenlightened one) have shield laws or operate under court rulings that grant journalists and their sources a “privilege” much like those afforded to lawyers and their clients, and therapists and their patients.
The bill has broad bipartisan support in both chambers. Salazar is co-sponsoring the measure in the Senate.
“A free and independent media is the cornerstone of any successful democracy,” he said. “I fully support the [act] to ensure reporters can be effective watchdogs for the public interest.
And this is, indeed, about the public’s interest, said Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., who authored the bill. “This is not about protecting reporters; it’s about protecting the public’s right to know,” he said.
Denver Post assistant features editor Christine Tatum (ctatum@) is national president of the Society of Professional Journalists.
