Ride the Lightning

Obama Signs FOIA Reform Bill Into Law

July 6, 2016

And why is that so important for this blog? You may have noted, from time to time, that our government is not exactly transparent with us when it comes to abuses of privacy rights. Hence, I am overjoyed to report that, just shy of the Freedom of Information Act's (FOIA) 50th birthday, President Obama signed the FOIA Improvement Act of 2016 into law last Thursday.

The bipartisan bill, passed by the House in mid-June, "codifies a statutory presumption of openness," which places the burden on agencies to justify withholding information rather than on the requester to justify release, according to a Committee on Oversight and Government Reform press release.

The FOIA reform bill makes transparency and disclosure of information a priority, and directs the Office of Management (OMB) and Budget to establish a single access website to allow users to submit their requests and review the status rather than submitting requests to agencies individually. Among the reforms, agencies must make "disclosable records and documents available for public inspection in an electronic format" as well as those that have been frequently requested (three or more times).

Now that's a law that everyone on both sides of the aisle can applaud.

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