Brechner News

In Minnesota, a Ramsey County judge has ordered the city of St. Paul to pay a resident more than $30,000 in damages and $750 in court costs for violating Minnesota’s open records law, according to reporting from KSTP. 

A coalition of 40 California newsrooms has published a study examining the challenges of large-scale public records requests. The California Reporting Project developed a tool, RequestAtlas, to manage unstructured data obtained through public record requests related to police use of force and misconduct. 

A Fulton County Superior Court judge in Georgia has ruled that the Atlanta Police Foundation (APF) must release 15 unredacted public records related to the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, known as “Cop City,” within 30 days. The records include board meeting agendas, budget documents, and emails with Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr. 

A May study titled “Lessons from the Dissolution of Mexico’s Information Commission” examines the March closure of Mexico’s national transparency commission.

Access to public records continues to vary widely by state, with Alabama ranking last in compliance, according to a recent analysis.

A new article in the Seattle University Law Review by former Brechner FOI Project Director Frank LoMonte looks at what is described as a "hole in the heart" of federal and state freedom-of-information laws: The absence of legal requirements to actually retain high-value records – or any meaningful penalty for failing to do so.

Newly released documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act reveal that the Federal Emergency Management Agency was aware of serious health risks following the February 2023 Norfolk Southern train derailment and controlled burn in East Palestine, Ohio. 

A new analysis in the Washington University Law Review finds that state address confidentiality programs (ACPs) meant to protect domestic violence survivors are often ineffective—and in some states, nonexistent. 

For nearly 30 years, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has released an annual report tracking the country’s greenhouse gas emissions—until this year.  
 

As public records requests continue to rise, a new paper in AI & Society argues that artificial intelligence could play a key role in helping government agencies manage the growing demand. 

The Mackinac Center for Public Policy has filed a lawsuit against Flint Community Schools for failing to comply with Michigan’s Freedom of Information Act. The legal complaint comes after the school district ignored a Feb. 17 records request for more than 50 business days—well past the legal deadline. 

An experiment published in Government Information Quarterly found that public record requesters who remind record custodians of the public records law are more likely to get the records they seek, particularly when asking for large amounts of data.