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Asked and Answered

Brown Act

How Do We Make a Community Service District Board Comply with the Brown Act?

[…] would be found in other provisions of law. If you believe the CSD Board violated the Brown Act, then you may wish to consider filing a complaint letter or bringing a legal action, which could help you obtain judicial scrutiny of the CSD Board’s actions and even potentially void any past decisions that were […]

January 20, 2021
Posts

Press Rights

FAC Supports Bill that Would Reopen California Prisons and Jails to Journalists

[…] to the press since the mid-1990s, during the state’s tough-on-crime era of Three Strikes laws and through lawsuits challenging unsafe conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic. In a letter authored by the California News Publishers Association, which is a co-sponsor of the bill along with the California Broadcasters Association, a coalition of 12 open-government and […]
- Press Freedom
March 1, 2023
Latest News

Cases Press Release

Shasta County Repeals Illegal Fee Law Following FAC and ACLU Demand

[…] barrier to transparency and accountability in government. After an investigation by FAC and ACLU, the organizations, representing news outlets Shasta Scout and the Record Searchlight, sent a letter to Shasta County to repeal its ordinance. Before the letter was sent, Shasta County had billed the Record Searchlight $1,200 to fulfill a request for records […]
- Government Transparency and Accountability
- Public Records
May 22, 2024
Asked and Answered

CPRA

Councilman asks intern on date via city issued cell

[…] Only purely personal information unrelated to 'the conduct of the public's business' could be considered exempt from this definition, i.e., the shopping list phoned from home, the letter to a public officer from a friend which is totally void of reference to governmental activities." Assembly Comm. on Statewide Information Policy, Appendix 1 to Journal […]

November 21, 2009
Asked and Answered

Newsgathering

Publishing leaked email

I have an email from a hospital system CEO sent to roughly 7,000 employees, actually every employee of the hospitals. We want to print aspects of the letter in which he bad-mouths a union. Question: Does the legal disclaimer at the bottom of the email mean anything? It says basically that the email is […]

June 14, 2009
Asked and Answered

Brown Act CPRA

Board Conducting Public’s Business Via Private Emails

[…] Records Act on the FAC's website here: http://firstamendmentcoalition.org/category/resources/access-to-records/ As for enforcing the Brown Act, the Act does not specify a particular way that a violation may be cured and corrected, but presumably the legislative body could satisfy the Brown Act by reopening the process to permit public awareness of all the facts and views, […]

June 24, 2010
Asked and Answered

Brown Act CPRA

Text-Messaging Public Records

[…] Only purely personal information unrelated to ‘the conduct of the public's business’ could be considered exempt from this definition, i.e., the shopping list phoned from home, the letter to a public officer from a friend which is totally void of reference to governmental activities." California State Univ., Fresno Ass'n, Inc. v. Superior Court, 90 […]

June 14, 2009
Posts

FAC Supports AB 1758 to Limit Cost of Courts Records in California

FAC supports Assembly Bill 1758, which would reduce barriers to public information by prohibiting California courts from charging unreasonable fees to search, view or download electronic records on court websites. Read our joint letter with the California News Publishers Association in support of AB 1758. You can track the bill's status on the California Legislature's website.
- Government Transparency and Accountability
- Public Records
April 14, 2023
Latest News

Cases

Amicus Briefs Digest, Sept. 2017

[…] a court denied attorneys’ fees to the LA Times, even though the Times won access to the records it sought. Monterey County police scanners: FAC joined a letter by a coalition of Central Coast news outlets urging police and fire officials in the Monterey County area to continue to provide media access to police […]
September 27, 2017
Asked and Answered

CPRA

Personnel Files

[…] reasons for why disclosure of performance evaluations (if not part of disciplinary records containing well-founded complaints of a "substantial nature") would constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy in light of the California Attorney General Opinion cited above. A sample PRA request letter can be found on the CFAC website at the following link: https://firstamendmentcoalition.org/cpra-primer/sample-cpra-request-letter/

June 14, 2009