Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council

Former newspaper editor Peter Fox recalls the “sick feeling” he got when he discovered his newspaper had been misled by Racine County officials who were withholding a much-anticipated report on problems at the county jail. It was 1987, and rumors abounded that a report commissioned by the county’s corporation counsel examining overcrowding and dangers at […]

The State of Wisconsin Elections Board enters into a $13 million contract with Accenture to create a statewide voter registration system. Certain lawmakers and pundits go wild, accusing Accenture of incompetence and threatening a legal challenge to the Elections Board’s action. Do these critics have a point? How did the Board settle on Accenture? The […]

Last spring, the newspaper I work for had a problem obtaining some public records from our local school district. Officials there demanded that we first send a check for $613.08 to cover the costs they expected to incur reviewing the records and deciding what information to black out. These costs put the records effectively beyond […]

Imagine you hear through the grapevine that your town’s board has been meeting with its lawyer and some political allies about a land deal. You might be affected, so you ask about the talks, and they respond: None of your business. Or you want to check out the zoning documents that your county board used […]

On Oct. 7, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals sided with The Janesville Gazette in the court’s first-ever application of the recent “Woznicki” amendments to the state’s Open Records Law. Those amendments, enacted in August 2003, were intended to define and limit the procedural rights created by the Wisconsin Supreme Court for record subjects in Woznicki […]

When I was growing up in rural America, my father used to say, “An informed public is better than an uninformed public.” It’s the same philosophy I try emulate as the publisher of a community newspaper in northwestern Wisconsin. But it’s frustrating to know that some elected officials and government employees don’t feel the same […]

The news that Wisconsin banks are being audited for sheltering income from corporate taxes has made headlines around the state. It is an issue of great importance to taxpayers, policy makers, business leaders, and others. But now that some of the audited banks have begun settling up with the taxman, the details are hush-hush. “Wisconsin […]

Wisconsin’s open meetings law does not mince words.”The public,” it declares, “is entitled to the fullest and most complete information regarding the affairs of government as is compatible with the conduct of governmental business.” Some Wisconsin communities, however, are seeking to avoid this clear mandate through the use of quasi-public entities funded with public dollars. […]

There’s a double standard in the state Open Meetings Law that the Waukesha County Board wants eliminated. So, too, should the rest of us. The Open Meetings Law prohibits a majority of a local elected body to meet in secret. That means, for example, that four or more members of a seven-member village board can’t […]

News reporters, editors and producers rely on Wisconsin’s open records and open meetings laws to obtain information. This is not always an easy task, as the laws do not address every public-access question that newsrooms encounter. For this reason, the Wisconsin Newspaper Association and Wisconsin Broadcasters Association have teamed up to provide their members with […]

Why do we need a strong open records law? One answer can be found in the eagerness of some public officials to avoid complying with it. These officials would rather not have the public looking over their shoulders, second-guessing their decisions. And so they scrutinize open records rulings in search of new ways to rebuff […]

When Gov. Jim Doyle signed a law reforming the state’s records statutes last August, it was hailed as a bright new day for open government in Wisconsin. The new law was a response to state Supreme Court decisions that flew in the face of the presumption that records should be open, accessible and released without […]

Just as protecting civil liberties often entails defending unpopular causes, ensuring the greatest possible access  to public information can mean opposing what seem, at first, to be perfectly sensible restrictions. Two examples of this can be found in bills now before the Wisconsin Legislature. The first, AB-448, would prohibit the copying of autopsy photos; the […]

Have you ever clipped a newspaper or magazine article and mailed it to a friend or family member?  If that person is a Wisconsin prisoner, he or she almost certainly did not receive it. For several years, the Department of Corrections has had in place a “publishers only” rule, restricting inmates to receiving such items […]

Suzanne Shell, a Colorado resident, learned the hard way that certain officials of Walworth County, Wisconsin,do not embrace open government. On March 27, 2003, Shell came to the Walworth County Courthouse in Elkhorn to do some filming for her documentary on child abuse investigations and prosecutions. Several hours later, she was in police custody, charged […]

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), federal legislation that aims to protect health information, is blocking access to personal health information that is in the public’s interest. Health care providers have long disclosed personal health data for purposes of treatment, research, public health initiatives, and insurance reimbursement, to name a few. Increasingly, such […]

The so-called Personal Protection Act now making its way through the state Legislature would allow concealed weapons virtually anywhere in the state, under the illogical theory that this would enhance public safety. But the most egregious part of this bill is its secrecy. As written, the proposed bill (SB-214 and AB-444) would exempt “records created […]

Do mosquitoes have HIPAA rights? You might have thought so if you read a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel story last September reporting that the first West Nile virus-positive mosquitoes had been detected in Milwaukee County. City Health Department officials refused to reveal where the mosquitoes had been trapped. They gave two reasons: not wanting to alarm […]

Every so often a case comes along that reminds us how valuable Wisconsin’s open records laws and open meeting laws are to the concept of a free press. Just such a case is now pending before the Wisconsin Supreme Court — GPS Inc. v. the Town of St. Germain. GPS Inc., a contracting company, asked […]

Against the backdrop of bitter partisan fighting over the state budget, there was a flagrant act of good government committed in Madison this political season. In a spirit of bipartisanship seldom seen these days, the Wisconsin Legislature passed a bill that will go along way toward restoring Wisconsin’s time-honored reputation for open, clean government. The […]