Both houses of Congress have approved a bill intended to toughen the Freedom of Information Act and increase the penalties on government agencies that fail to comply with requests. Introduced December 14 by Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and John Cornyn (R-Tex.), the Senate passed by unanimous consent the Openness Promotes Effectiveness in our National (OPEN) Government Act, S. 2488, then sent it on to the House, which approved it by voice vote December 18.
The legislation establishes a telephone and internet-based FOIA tracking system that provides status information and an estimated completion date on individual requests. The bill also:
Senators Leahy and Conryn have tried since 2005 to get this legislation passed, but met with some stumbling blocks. Rick Blum, coordinator of the Sunshine in Government Initiative, said that earlier versions of the bill would have required new statutes that exempted certain records from disclosure to explicitly mention FOIA, but that fell by the wayside. “All that means is that media groups and others will have to watch bills closely, very closely, and have a seat at the table during any new efforts to hide information,” he told the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press December 19.
Because of strong bipartisan support for the measure—the first expansion of FOIA since the Electronic Freedom of Information Act Amendments of 1996—President Bush has not stated his intention either to sign or veto the legislation.
Posted December 21, 2007.