Archive for the 'Public Records' Category
Statistics for a changing world: Google Public Data Explorer in Labs
March 8th, 2010Google Blog – “Last year, we released a public data search feature that enables people to quickly find useful statistics in search. More recently, we expanded this service to include information from the World Bank, such as population data for every region in the world. More and more public agencies, non-profits and other organizations are [...]
Court ruling guts state public record law, lawyer says
February 1st, 2010Fairbanks Daily News Miner – “If the state does not preserve a document, then it isn’t a public document, a recent court ruling suggests, which could give public employees the power to keep anything private by failing to preserve it. Veteran Alaska attorney Don Mitchell has appealed the ruling, saying that it “guts” the law [...]
New Web site sheds light on state spending (TN)
January 31st, 2010Tennessean – “The Tennessee Center for Policy Research has just launched a Web site — OpenTennessee.org — that makes this information accessible at the click of a mouse. OpenTennessee.org is the state’s only searchable, comprehensive transparency Web site. Tennesseans now can access state employee payrolls, retiree pensions and every single payment made by state agencies [...]
Bill would limit access to online court records
January 27th, 2010Journal Sentinel – “Madison — Public access to online court records would be dramatically scaled back under a bill before the state Assembly. The bill by Rep. Marlin Schneider (D-Wisconsin Rapids) would make court records available online only for those who are convicted of a crime, found liable in a civil case, evicted, or issued [...]
Nobel Prize-winning scientists support online access to federally funded research results to spur innovation
November 16th, 2009The Hill – “Last week, 41 Nobel-Prize winning scientists issued an open letter to Congress, calling on lawmakers to ensure that the results of scientific research conducted using taxpayer dollars be put online, and made accessible to and useable by the public. As extraordinary as it seems, at a time when you can get [...]
World Bank public data, now in search
November 11th, 2009More public data searching, courtesy of Google
Ariz. court rules records law covers ‘metadata’
October 29th, 2009Associated Press – “Hidden data embedded in electronic public records must be disclosed under Arizona’s public records law, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday in a case that attracted interest from media and government organizations.”
Read the opinion
Appeals court upholds decision to make FSU, NCAA records public
October 1st, 2009News Press – “A unanimous three-judge panel ruled records in Florida State University’s fight with the National Collegiate Athletic Association should be made public. The opinion, written by 1st District Court of Appeal Judge Philip Padovano, upholds a lower court’s decision. The ruling rejects NCAA arguments that the documents are not public records, that student-privacy [...]
SEC Announces Successor to EDGAR Database:
August 19th, 2008More from beSpacific
More on Free Access to Public Records
December 31st, 2007Meg Hayden (Electronic Resources Librarian, Mass. Trial Court Law Libraries) writes:
“I thought you’d like to know that the public law librarians here in Mass. have been working to put our own cases online– http://www.lawlib.state.ma.us/2007/12/massachusetts-cases-online.html. We’re adding over 100 cases per day, and currently have 10,000 cases available at the site. There is no [...]
Public Records Wire
December 30th, 2007Public Records Wire – “An open system for cataloging, sharing and discovering new public records databases. The system promotes the databases that are most used and voted upon with the goal of enhancing overall quality of public records databases.”
Public records databases and tagging. Who would have thunk it? (via)
Public Access to “Certain” Criminal Records?
September 11th, 2007“The federal Judiciary is seeking comment on the privacy and security implications related to public Internet access to certain documents in criminal case files. The Court Administration and Case Management Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States is studying these issues so the Conference can develop policy guidance for the federal courts.” (via)
More on Online Court Rulings
August 19th, 2007NYT – “The domination of two legal research services over the publication of federal and state court decisions is being challenged by an Internet gadfly who has embarked on an ambitious project to make more than 10 million pages of case law available free online.”
Keep Them Public
August 12th, 2007AP – “The American Bar Association has scrapped a proposal that called for closing certain arrest and court records to the public.”
Thank goodness.
Public Records Research
July 23rd, 2007Lifehacker has a few tips.
Public Records Debate Continues
June 25th, 2007Ah, there are two sides to every story. I love public records for research (and my clients thank me for it), but it can get a bit freaky at times. (via)
Speaking of Public Records…
March 15th, 2007Check out this new blog from two researchers at the Charlotte Observer called "Your Right to Know". It’s about how to best use Public Records for research. Loevly. (via)
