It’s a nice change of pace to talk about a good piece of legislation coming out of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Last week the panel approved the Open Government Act, a bill which strengthens and makes a number of key improvements to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

As we said last year in a letter to bill sponsors John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) applauding the measure, the public has a right to know what the government is doing on its behalf, and FOIA is a vital tool toward that end. The Open Government Act closes many of the loopholes left open by FOIA, and rightly takes advantage of the power of the Internet to disseminate public information.

Another welcome aspect of the measure is that it requires government agencies to respond in a timelier manner to requests made under the Freedom of Information Act. Under the bill, agencies would be required to provide information within 20 days of receiving a FOIA request or be subject to penalties.

The one catch? Timing. While we applaud the Judiciary Committee for passing the bill, it is going to be tough to get it all the way to the President’s desk in the busy days before lawmakers head home in the run-up to the midterm elections.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 26th, 2006 at 5:03 pm and is filed under Open Government. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.