Responding to a Freedom of Information Act request, the IRS has released a series of documents, including training materials used by agents relating to how it recognizes and treats exempt organizations like nonprofits. The FOIA request was made by ...

From the Boulder Weekly: A recent hearing related to the bungled Broomfield election made it clear that some public officials — even judges — still just don’t get it when it comes to coughing up open records. Election reform activist Marilyn Marks, who has exposed many untoward practices — like using ballots that can be traced back to individual voters — got dragged into court by Broomfield officials after she had the gall to ask for public election records, including voted ballots. Since it’s costly to hire an attorney for such proceedings, it’s a pretty effective form of intimidating citizens ...

From The Denver Post: The Littleton School District needs to step up and begin talking about what happened in the months before 18-year-old Karl Pierson stormed into Arapahoe High School on Dec. 13, firing a pump-action shotgun that killed 17-year-old Claire Davis before killing himself. For more than a month, district and school officials have refused to talk to reporters about the events, referring all open records requests for even basic information to their lawyers. On Thursday and Friday, the district maintained its silence even after school security guard Cameron Rust posted a lengthy diatribe against Arapahoe High officials, alleging ...

From The Denver Post YourHub: After two public ballot initiatives passed this fall, Littleton and its city council feels at least one of them will make it more difficult and expensive to conduct the city's business. The measure with the most impact reduces reasons for going into executive session, or behind closed doors, from six to two. Those two are if executive session is required by federal or state law, such as in the case of a terrorist attack, or the need to confer with an attorney for a legal matter, such as a lawsuit. But Littleton City Manager Michael ...

From The Denver Post: A bill to strengthen Colorado's shield law is a long time coming but so is an update to the antiquated law that offers no protection to bloggers. Sen. Bernie Herpin, R-Colorado Springs, is sponsoring a bill to make it tougher to put reporters on the stand in Colorado. Herpin conjured the bill after realizing Fox News reporter Jana Winter may not have been afforded protection under Colorado's law. She could have been forced to decide between jail or revealing who told her about contents of a notebook from Aurora theater shooting suspect James Holmes. Thankfully, a ...

From The Tribune (Greeley):  By Ben DeGrow The Independence Institute Colorado potentially faces a wasted opportunity in undertaking a push for greater school financial transparency. If state leaders talk up transparency as a new project and in vague terms, then they may miss the benefit of lessons already learned and fail to create a genuinely useful online tool. Part of Amendment 66’s billion-dollar promise was the creation of a website to track nearly every tax dollar collected and spent in K-12 public education. However, an overwhelming majority of voters sent the initiative to the ash heap. During last week’s State ...

From The Gazette (Colorado Springs): Moving Sky Sox baseball stadium downtown no longer is part of the City for Champions plan but all information gathered to support that project is locked away. Colorado Spring’s city attorney will not release the results of a community survey taken by the city last summer to gauge public interest in a downtown baseball stadium even though plans to move Sky Sox stadium downtown were dumped in December. In October, City Attorney Chris Melcher said the results of the survey were being kept secret and considered to be a “work product.” He denied the Gazette’s request, ...

From The Durango Herald:  Colorado’s state Legislature reconvened Wednesday, and while this session does not promise to be as boisterous or controversial as the last, it should have highlights. Among those are three bills that, taken together, amount to a bipartisan push to bolster the state’s commitment to defending freedom of information. One would strengthen Colorado’s shield law for reporters. Another would set an expiration date for data from surveillance photos. The third would make fees for research and information retrieval from government agencies uniform statewide. All three should be approved. (There also is a bill for a federal shield ...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: Melissa MacGowan, Administrator NATIONAL FREEDOM OF INFORMATION COALITION 101E Reynolds Journalism Institute Columbia, MO 65211 (573) 882-4856 · macgowanm@missouri.edu Supported by a grant from the ...

From The Denver Post:  By Alicia Caldwell Denver Post Editorial Writer The Chris Christie "Bridge-gate" scandal was the talk of the political world last week, and it was no different here at The Post. At one point, I heard a colleague mutter something along the lines of: "Nothing like that ever happens in Colorado. The politicians are too clean." That stuck with me, and I wondered whether Colorado is indeed a haven for the more virtuous. Is there really less here in the way of rank ambition and unprincipled use of power? Frankly, that's hard to believe. We do, however, ...