A political watchdog organization has withdrawn a proposal to require bloggers to disclose payments from political campaigns. The proposal was opposed by bloggers and others who said it could chill free speech. -db From The Sacramento Bee, May 3, 2012, by Jim Sanders. Full story
The Los Angeles County Supervisors admitted they had erred in meeting behind closed doors to discuss with state officials the transfer of prison inmates to the County. Los Angeles County agreed to pay legal fees for Californians Aware which brought the lawsuit and are releasing transcripts of the September closed meetings. -db From The Antelope Valley Times, April 20, 2012, by The AV Times Staff. Full story
Three lawyers with experience in litigating Freedom of Information Act cases charge that the Obama administration has performed poorly in promoting government transparency. Whereas Attorney General Eric Holder said he would only defend agencies when it was clear that disclosure was contrary to law or would cause harm, in actual practice since his pronouncement Holder has never refused to defend an agency withholding information. -db From a commentary for The National Law Journal, April 16,
The FBI lost another round Wednesday in its quest to withhold records detailing the late Memphis photographer Ernest Withers’ secret work as an informant in the 1960s. A federal judge held that the FBI made errors and lapses but also deliberate decisions that confirmed the fact that Withers was an informant, making his file eligible for release to the Memphis Commercial Appeal under the Freedom of Information Act. -db From the Memphis Commercial Appeal,
Tulare County is asking to be reimbursed for court costs in a case brought by the Time-Delta/Advance-Register and the California Newspaper Publishers Association. The newspaper interests lost the case in 2010, and the County is claiming that the suit was “clearly frivolous and lacking in merit.” The lawsuit claimed that the Tulare County Board of Supervisors violated the Brown Act, the state’s open meeting law, in holding closed door lunch meetings the supervisors claimed were