Peter Scheer

The First Amendment Coalition today filed suit to make public the terms of a Sonoma County agency’s contract to promote county wines to football  fans visiting the Bay Area for the February 7 Super Bowl. FAC filed a public records request for the contract, under which the Sonoma County Tourism Bureau, together with organizations representing vineyards and wine growers, reportedly committed as much as $1 million to  its deal with Super Bowl 50 Host Committee.

The Stingray is a controversial cell phone surveillance tool used by police departments in major US cities, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose and San Diego.  Also known as an “IMSI catcher,” the Stingray operates by mimicking a cell phone tower, which causes cell phones in the vicinity to transmit information revealing their owners and the phones’ exact location. In 2015 FAC filed a public records suit against the San Diego Police Department

BY PETER SCHEER–Sometime during the next few months, the US Supreme Court will issue a decision that could profoundly weaken public employee unions in California and across the country. By all accounts, the justices, in the oral argument in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, signalled that they are poised to rule that workers’ payment of dues to public sector unions must be voluntary. Specifically, the Court is expected to strike down, on first amendment grounds,

BY PETER SCHEER–Does the first amendment apply to government speech? In recent decisions, the Supreme Court has answered that question in the negative.  Constitutional free speech protections apply to people (and corporations and other private legal entities), but they do not limit or regulate governmental speech, the Court declared. The implications of this doctrine are troublesome because the decision to label speech as governmental has the effect of immunizing the government from challenge under the