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Unlocking Public Records in California
An overview of the California Public Records Act, the state’s primary freedom-of-information law, and tips and tricks for overcoming barriers to information. This session can be customized for journalists, with examples of news coverage ideas and issues unique to newsrooms. Sessions can feature interactive exercises, introduction to resources, and Q&A.

Reporter’s Field Guides
An in-depth training on our Reporter’s Field Guides on immigration enforcement, police shootings and election day access. The guides offer tips about legal rights and detailed instructions for accessing information to fuel impactful journalism. Newsrooms and journalism organizations can request training on one specific field guide or a session that would briefly cover multiple guides.

Customized Newsroom Trainings
Our press education team can work with your newsroom or journalism organization to create customized trainings on beat-specific public records, press access and rights, including obtaining police records, political watchdog reporting, covering public schools and universities, data reporting, protest coverage and more. Connect with us to suggest a topic.

Uncovering Police Records in California
A detailed overview of accessing public records about law enforcement use of force and misconduct in California. This is a supplement to the CPRA tutorial that goes deep into recent law changes that opened up public access to certain categories of records of police personnel and investigatory records. It can be customized for journalists or community members.

Public Meetings Tutorial
An introduction to California’s public meetings laws, the Brown Act and Bagley-Keene Act, with an overview of agenda requirements, closed session and public comment rules, teleconferencing provisions, and rules specific to members of the press. This session can be customized for journalists, with examples of story ideas and interactive exercises.

Press Rights 101
An overview of key newsgathering laws and limits that any California journalist should know. The session covers considerations for recording in public and restricted places, special press access rights in California law that affects newsgathering, and a primer on shielding confidential news sources and notes.

Protest Rights
A presentation on the rights of protesters and the press covering them, with an overview of the law and common concerns.

Access Democracy: An Overview (60 mins)
A crash course on California’s government transparency and laws affecting newsgathering. In this session, FAC’s experts will give an introduction to the California Public Records Act, open-meetings laws and state-specific press access laws. We will also discuss rights and risks while recording in various settings. This presentation is useful for journalists new to California or new to local government reporting, and for anyone looking to deepen their understanding of how to be a government watchdog.

Meet & Greet with FAC Staff (30 minutes)
Get to know members of the FAC legal, advocacy and press education staff to receive an introduction to resources, how FAC works and to discuss potential advocacy, legal or educational collaborations. These informational Q&A sessions may be useful for community groups, journalism organizations that do advocacy, educators and newsrooms interested in identifying potential resources. These are not suitable for legal consultations on specific issues (for specific legal questions and referrals, please see our Hotline resource).

General Speaker Request
Want to bring a FAC speaker to your classroom, conference or community? FAC staff are available to give lectures, talks and presentations on topics related to First Amendment, government transparency and newsgathering issues.

Watchdog Workshop
FAC offers an intensive Watchdog Workshop for journalists, as a day-long symposium conducted in person. This is a special event organized with partners by request. Reach out to request a sample agenda.