Recently, when I have spoken about "data as evidence" in several academic settings, there has been a recurring question. Essentially it concerns the fact that dishonest people acting in bad faith will generate false, badly formed, or misleading data and propose it as evidence in support of predetermined (i.e. prejudiced / pre-judged) positions. To this day, parties or groups that base themselves in "values" or "beliefs" that are assumed a priori – i.e. values that are non-negotiable – in fact, not subject to discussion -- dominate our political landscape. One has only to watch the response of some of the Republican Congressional caucus to President Obama’s discussion there this past week to see clear evidence of this. A fundamental tenet for these believers is that compromise with any other set of beliefs represents moral "relativism" – which is equivalent to amorality (if not immorality).

I believe that much of the trouble we experience in contemporary civil discourse can be traced to a confusion, conscious or otherwise, of the distinctions between "Church" (institutionalization of religious belief) and "State" (government based on trust in a diverse and tolerant community). From the time of European settlement of this continent we have had problems in separating Church and State [See LoC for an excellent summary history ] AND, concomitantly, in maintaining the distinction between empirical knowledge as a basis for public policies and commitments to "truth" based in belief. The former can be understood as "objective and invariant" (as discussed previously) the latter as subjective and highly variable -- the phrase used by John Searle of UC Berkeley, "first person ontology" is well applicable.

With objective, scientifically based knowledge, we have the opportunity of arriving – through investigation and discourse -- at common agreements (within some bounds of reasonable, relative probability). Respecting contending "truths," based in belief, we have the very strong possibility of violence and conflict -- consider – Northern Ireland or South Asia? It is wrong and misguided to characterize the separation of Church and State as somehow inimical to one system of belief or another.

Separation of Church and State is fundamental to a diverse and inclusive society and protects religious freedom and the right of individual conscience. Without separation – and religious tolerance (as clearly expressed in the Bill of Rights) – a change in political power may result in murder. We are all too familiar – elsewhere in the world -- with the consequences of confusing government and religion.

And so we must return to the problem of objectivity and pragmatism in civil discourse. Today we are faced with a range of a priori values – beliefs that are considered "true" and above debate. On the right, the most fundamental of these a priori tenets is that "government is bad" [The Reagan/Thatcher formulation being: "Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem."] coupled with the corollary that raising funds to support government (taxing) is bad. Aside from the fact that this is fundamentally subversive (!) of the common welfare – it is also impractical and nonsensical. But I would also argue that on the left, there are similar a priori values – i.e. that government is good and corporations are bad.

All forms of human organization are subject to corruption and abuse – certainly this is true of government at all levels – but is absolutely true of corporate governance and is also true of private sector non-profit governance. I believe that the most stable and sustainable principle for our American system of democracy is justice based in the common value of fairness, and this value demands commitment to tolerant civil discourse embodying both rationality and science. It will be protected by an ongoing commitment to transparency and accountability in governance of all sectors: for profit, not for profit and public. (In recent years we have all seen flagrant examples of abuse in all three sectors. Journalism and publishing under first amendment protections together with free, open and effective access to data and information have been essential to the process of transparency and accountability.)

The previously mentioned GRI [SEE: http://www.globalreporting.org/ ] -- and similar initiatives working for transparency, accountability and rigorous standards of evidence –- present a clear alternative to organizational business-as-usual.

(As an aside, I will here note that expressions of anger – verbal or physical - as a part of political discourse – for example shouts of "You lie!" -- are signs of impotence, sure evidence of the abandonment of civil discourse, of the rational intention of serving the common welfare.)

As custodians of knowledge, as teachers and as advocates, librarians have always been primary defenders of fair and equitable access to knowledge for the common good. The World Wide Web is a technical fulfillment of the most basic ethos of librarianship. For the first time in human history, we have the technological means of sharing knowledge worldwide. But the existence of a global network does not assure that all people will have access, it does not assure that what flows across the network will be effectively useful in informing public discourse for the largest number of people.

We, librarians, have an obligation, in all our interactions to support the broadest possible access by all – freely, openly and effectively. We must maintain critical sensitivity to the practical usefulness of resources provided over global networks, to teach critical and evaluative skills and to assist wherever possible in interpreting and refining available resources.

Even with this year's introduction of S.Res. 118 and H.R. 3762, it is still important to encourage our Government to make Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports publicly accessible online!

Thus, I finally updated the latest list of Bills and contact information for the sponsoring Congressmen in the Delicious.com "CRS" tag Delicious.com "CRS" tag.

See also: CRS Reports to the People! Part 1 and Part 2 for more information on how to contact/write to your Congressmen.

As Jim mentioned, GPO has posted presentation materials from the recently concluded Depository Library Conference.

One of the files worthy of your attention is the presentation slides from:

A Tale of Two Economies: Government Information from the New Deal and Now by Marianne Ryan, Associate University Librarian for Public Services, Northwestern University Library and Catherine Jervey, Director, Market Planning Legislative and Historical Services, LexisNexis Academic and Library Solutions

The slides give a govdocs powered, side by side comparison of the reactions of FDR and President Obama to their respective economic crises. It makes for interesting reading and puts today's economic troubles in perspective.

It's not touched on in the presentation slides, but I'm interested in a big difference between the 1930s and today. For the most part, regular people didn't have access to the New Deal legislation before it was passed. Today, whether or not it's taken advantage of, people around the country have access to proposed legislation in their own homes.

Would the wide-ranging legislation of the New Deal have been passed if there had been wide public access to the proposed legislation? It's an interesting "What If" scenario.

Gov't Unveils New Short URLs, By Andrew Noyes National Journal, "Tech Daily Dose" (October 13, 2009).

The General Services Administration on Tuesday announced a new application that allows government employees to shorten their Web addresses. Go.USA.gov lets officials create short .gov URLs out of any .gov, .mil, or .si.edu URLs. As of 5:30 p.m., Go.USA.gov has shortened 249 URLs that have been clicked 14,299 times.

Our friends over at Sunlight Labs have announced a new project they call that "National Data Catalog" that will build on data.gov:

Today I’m happy to announce Sunlight Labs is stealing an idea from our government. Data.gov is an incredible concept, and the implementation of it has been remarkable. We’re going to steal that idea and make it better. Because of politics and scale there’s only so much the government is going to be able to do. There are legal hurdles and boundaries the government can’t cross that we can. For instance: there’s no legislative or judicial branch data inside Data.gov and while Data.gov links off to state data catalogs, entries aren’t in the same place or format as the rest of the catalog. Community documentation and collaboration are virtual impossibilities because of the regulations that impact the way Government interacts with people on the web.

We think we can add value on top of things like Data.gov and the municipal data catalogs by autonomously bringing them into one system, manually curating and adding other data sources and providing features that, well, Government just can’t do. There’ll be community participation so that people can submit their own data sources, and we’ll also catalog non-commercial data that is derivative of government data like OpenSecrets. We’ll make it so that people can create their own documentation for much of the undocumented data that government puts out and link to external projects that work with the data being provided.

If you're interested in helping out on this effort, please join the National Data Catalog Google Group at http://groups.google.com/group/datacatalog?lnk=gcamv.

Our friends at Open Congress recently provided a concrete example of the benefit of being able to work with government provided data. In a July 1, 2009 blog posting titled See all the Last-Minute Changes to the Climate Change Bill blogger Donny Shaw notes:

We may never get the details of the back-room negotiating that took place leading up to the bill’s passage in the House on Friday, but with OpenCongress’s legislative versioning tool we can see exactly what was changed in the bill in the process and then start to figure out why. Just go to the text of the bill as passed by the House and select “Show Changes.” You can scan the entire bill and see, with color-coded text, exactly what was changed – red, stuck-out text denoting changed or removed sections in the bill, and green text denoting sections that were inserted or modified.

Donny spent about 30 minutes scanning through the bill's changes and documented what he found. What can you find?

This sort of quick work at finding rush changes is only possible because copyright-free federal legislation is available to transparency organizations like OpenCongress to put into their change revision software. This gives regular citizens specialized access to legislation that was formerly only available to subscribers to expensive premium services. This is a good thing. The Government Printing Office's talks with the Library of Congress about bulk distribution of legislative data will only make things easier.

One great way to get your head around a large government dataset is to view it using Google Earth. I went on a hunt for the most interesting, striking and geography based government data sets currently available in the KML format used by Google Earth. There is a large gallery of tours and layers available from Google Earth's site, including some based on government data - but I wanted to look beyond them.

Here are eleven data sources (in no particular order) that have KML files ready and waiting for you to download. For some of these you will need to read the instructions associated with the KML to understand what you are looking at and what special features are enabled. Some have multiple datasets within a single KML file -- others include animations. Often when you open them in Google Earth they will start out with either a helpful note or a built in graphical key.

• USDA Forest Service: MODIS Active Fire Mapping Program: View fire detection data and incident information
• USGS Earthquake Hazards Program: real-time earthquake data (updated every 5 minutes!), geologic features and virtual tours of historic earthquakes.
• FEMA Flood Hazards: Stay Dry provides basic flood hazard map information from FEMA's National Flood Hazard Layer for specific addresses while NFHL (National Flood Hazard Layer) appears to be a more general application that displays flood hazard zones, floodways, base flood elevations, cross sections and coastal transects and much more.
• NASA: Goddard Scientific Visualization Studio: provides various visualization layers including Tectonic Plates Boundaries and African Fires during 2002. Dig through the various categories, there is a lot here.
• Nasa Jet Propulsion Laboratory OnEarth: multiple options are available for viewing daily updated views of earth from satellites. Very striking!
• gCensus: provides access to data from the 2000 US Census. The site lets you browse for various elements of data and generate a KML file you can then view via Google Earth.
• Air Quality Now: provides current and forcasted air quality conditions for locations across the USA. It is a product of a partnership of multiple US Government agencies.
• National Weather Service: has a full page of KML layers related to all aspects of weather - past, present and predicted.
• National Gallery of Art: Afghanistan Hidden Treasures from the National Museum: visit Aï Khanum, Tillya Tepe, and Begram—that and examine Afghan Treasures
• National Park Service: National Register of Historic Places: provides Google Earth layers per region of the USA that mark historic places.
• District of Columbia Data Catalog: provides a wide range of data about our nations capital. You must supply some simple data to identify yourself before downloading these KML files. This is just a taste of what various regional governments are providing. Give your home state, district or territory's website a look to see if you can find KML data available.

Have a favorite KML formatted government data set I missed? Please share it in the comments. I found many of these by starting in Goggle's US Government Search and searching for Google Earth.

From 1981 until 1998, Anne Heanue and the fine folks at the Washington Office of the American Library Association (ALA) published an amazing series called Less Access to Less Information by and about the U.S. Government, a chronology of efforts to restrict and privatize government information. In 1986, the publication was listed in Project Censored's annual review, Top 25 censored stories for 1986.

I recently had a nice email exchange with Emily Sheketoff, Associate Executive Director of ALA and manager of the Washington Office in which I suggested that Less Access to Less Information ought to be online for the world to see, read, share etc. Emily graciously gave me permission to digitize the series. So, with the help of Rick and Megan Prelinger, Robert Miller and others at the Internet Archive, I give you Less Access to Less information by and about the U.S. government in several formats including text, flip book, PDF, and DjVu.

• 1981-1987 chronology
• 1988-1991 chronology
• 1990-1996 chronology

I'm still on the hunt for the last 2 years of the series, but haven't come across them yet. If anyone's got them hanging around their bookshelves and would lend them to me, drop me an email (freegovinfo AT gmail DOT com) and I'll tell you where to send them.

[This is a repost of my original blog post about Less Access. I reposted it to the library so it wouldn't get lost. JRJ]

A recent event shows why free access to the federal courts' Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER) is important.

That event is Chrysler's bankruptcy. This is an event of high enough interest that PACER itself chose to highlight their holdings of the Chrysler bankruptcy docket.

Perhaps highlight is too strong a word. To see anything you need a PACER account and be prepared to pay fees under these conditions (bolding mine):

Access to web based PACER systems will generate an $.08 per page charge. The per page charge applies to the number of pages that results from any search, including a search that yields no matches (one page for no matches.) The charge applies whether or not pages are printed, viewed, or downloaded.

If PACER access were free, any interested citizen could monitor the bankruptcy case for themselves instead of getting a filtered view from media. They could see how the company, the shareholders and the union were being treated in the process.

PACER will continue to generate documents of national interest as GM follows Chrysler into bankruptcy court. Congress ought to mandate free access to all of PACER. The cost to do is an infinitesimal portion of the money paid for auto industry bailouts.

see this link for chat logs and more details on GITCO

Scroll down and start typing to join the chat. or if it does not seems to connect join here
What is Meebo and how do I get set up?

TOPIC: GITCO committee structure and our impact within GODORT and beyond

Accessing government information electronically is now common in both US and international contexts. How can GITCO best position itself withing GODORT/ALA and beyond to provide leadership on issues associated with electronic government information?

This session is meant to be a brainstorm -- to collect ideas and examples, rather than to follow each contribution to its conclusion. The room will be open after the session if you would like to add things after the planned session. There is also a brief participant survey which includes a place for feedback.

Agenda for Today's Forum:

* introductions
* logistics
* reflections on past projects
* reflections on committee structure within GODORT
*take the survey

see this link for April chat logs, upcoming May date and more details on GITCO

Scroll down and start typing to join the chat. or if it does not seems to connect join here
What is Meebo and how do I get set up?

TOPIC: emerging issues in ADVOCACY for electronic government information

Accessing government information electronically is now common in both US and international contexts. How have communications with government providers, with users and communities changed?

This session is meant to be a brainstorm -- to collect ideas and examples, rather than to follow each contribution to its conclusion. The room will be open after the session if you would like to add comments after the planned session. There is also a brief participant survey which includes a place for feedback.

Agenda for Today's Forum:

*introductions
*logistics
*how have communications with government information providers changed? US/international, etc.
*what are the most important things users need to know now to gain access to electronic gov info -- how should librarians be supporting these needs?
*How can GITCO help librarians with electronic gov info advocacy? What resources, or tools should we be producing?
*take the survey

see this link for April and May dates and more details on GITCO

Scroll down and start typing to join the chat. or if it does not seems to connect join here
What is Meebo and how do I get set up?

TOPIC: Emerging issues for USERS of electronic government information

Accessing government information electronically is now common in both US and international contexts. How have user experience and requirements changed?

This session is meant to be a brainstorm -- to collect ideas and examples, rather than to follow each contribution to its conclusion. The room will be open after the session if you would like to add comments after the planned session. There is also a brief participant survey which includes a place for feedback.

Agenda for Today's Forum:

*introductions
*logistics
*how are users accessing it now? US/international, etc.
*what do users ask now -- have questions changed?
*digital divide?
*take the survey

My earlier post, CRS Reports to the People!, dealt with which congressmen to contact and which congressmen sponsored what bills in the past, etc. But now I would like to offer some sample letters that you can emulate and send. I sent all of mine just after the inauguration of President Obama and will let you know what kinds of responses I get.

Here is a sample letter to send to those who have sponsored similar bills about publicly releasing all CRS Reports in the past (be sure to refer to my previous post that lists all these bills and their sponsors in your letter!):

The Honorable [full name]
[Room #] [Name] Senate [or] House Office Building
United States House of Representatives [or] United States Senate
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Senator:
or
Dear Representative:

Due to your [introduction/co-sponsorship] of BILL [X], I am writing to seek your support yet again in addressing the need for making Congressional Research Service Reports available to the public in a way that they can be easily obtained. American taxpayers spend nearly $100 million a year to fund the Congressional Research Service, yet it remains cumbersome to acquire these informative reports. Several libraries and non-profit organizations have sought to collect as many of the released reports as possible. Unfortunately, there is no feasible way to obtain all CRS reports, therefore, I believe that it would be best if Congress made all CRS Reports available to the public online.

President Obama has demonstrated and fosters the spirit of open access and transparency during his administration, as a Government Documents Librarian and contributor for the Free Government Information website [list your credentials, affiliations, etc. or simply say "as a tax paying citizen], I strongly believe that there is no greater time than now to address the need for the availability of these educational and beneficial reports to the public.

Thank you for your attention. I look forward to your reply.

Sincerely,

[Your Name]
[Your official title/degree credentials]
[Contact Address and Email]

If the Congressmen you are writing to have not sponsored a bill related to the public release of all CRS Reports, then use this nearly identical form letter:

The Honorable [full name]
[Room #] [Name] Senate [or] House Office Building
United States House of Representatives [or] United States Senate
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Senator:
or
Dear Representative:

I am writing to seek your support in addressing the need for making Congressional Research Service Reports available to the public in a way that they can be easily obtained. Previous bills addressing this topic have been introduced by Congressmen, but were unsuccessful. Most recently, these included H.R. 2545 (2007) and S. Res. 401 (2007).

American taxpayers spend nearly $100 million a year to fund the Congressional Research Service, yet it remains cumbersome to acquire these informative reports. Several libraries and non-profit organizations have sought to collect as many of the released reports as possible. Unfortunately, there is no feasible way to obtain all CRS reports, therefore, I believe that it would be best if Congress made all CRS Reports available to the public.

President Obama has demonstrated and fosters the spirit of open access and transparency during his administration, as a Government Documents Librarian and contributor for the Free Government Information website [list your credentials, affiliations, etc. or simply say "as a tax paying citizen], I strongly believe that there is no greater time than now to address the need for the availability of these educational and beneficial reports to the public.

Thank you for your attention. I look forward to your reply.

Sincerely,

[Your Name]
[Your official title/degree credentials]
[Contact Address and Email]

Our friends at The Gov Doc blog have put out an emergency appeal to help save the Nevada State Library's Head of Government Publications.

All of us on the FGI Volunteer team support asking the Nevada State Library to reconsider its position.

Here is The Gov Doc post in its entirety. I'll have a few comments after:

=====================
Greetings to all.

We hope everyone had a fun & refreshing Thanksgiving holiday. Ours were well spent with family and plenty of good food however we received some distressing news upon returning to work. We learned that the Nevada State Library and Archives has decided to eliminate the position, Head of Government Publications. The reason we are distressed is because this position is crucial for the capturing, cataloging, and dissemination of state publications and we fear that without the leadership that this position provides Nevada publications will slip into oblivion to the detriment of the people – the people whose taxes pay for this research and are therefore entitled to the opportunity to access this information.

Below is a letter of protest that you can cut & paste into a new message to send to Ms. Daphne DeLeon and Mr. Michael E. Fischer. Please feel free to edit the letter to personalize it or write your own. Don’t forget to sign your name at the bottom complete with your organization and title.

Here are their email addresses, please include both in the “Send To” line:

Daphne DeLeon, ddeleon@nevadaculture.org

Michael E. Fischer, mfischer@nevadaculture.org

One last thing, please send a blind copy of your email to Ian Campbell (icampbell@washoecounty.us) and Lisa Printz (lprintz@washoecounty.us).

Thank you and hopefully together we can make a difference,

Ian and Lisa

Attn: Daphne DeLeon, Division Administrator, Nevada State Library & Archive

Michael E. Fischer, Director, Nevada Department of Cultural Affairs

It was with shock and dismay that we learned about the Nevada State Library's decision to eradicate the position, Head of Government Publications. And it is with the great concern stimulated by this decision that we are writing to request that the state reconsider what we believe to be a short-sighted decision that will negatively impact current and future Nevada residents' access to critical information. When one considers that the federal government produces 70% of the world's information it becomes apparent that federally funded information is invaluable and since tax-payers dollars purchase or support these research endeavors the citizens of this nation have a right to access this information. Much of the states' research receives partial funding from the federal government and therefore is included in the figure (70%) given above. Compounding traditional problems of access to government funded research are the changes in the dissemination of this information to the populous. Due to advances in technology and in an effort to save money most government funded research is only available online therefore, capturing and cataloging this information for the purpose of retrieval are vital to the community's information needs especially since governmental agencies are not obligated to maintain access to this information. So, much of this information is ephemeral in its availability unless someone captures and catalogs it. Currently, there is a phenomenal amount of previously released information that needs to be captured and cataloged in addition to the present research being released now and future research that will require capturing and cataloging for without this work preserving access to federal and state research will not be possible. While there are many individuals attempting to apply order to federal documents, there are far fewer that work towards capturing, cataloging, and disseminating state government publications. This position, Head of Government Publications, fulfills this role and provides much needed leadership in the enactment of the NRS 378.170 and for the state of Nevada in developing a Nevada state publications depository to ensure the permanent retention of state publications. We feel that this position, Head of Government Publications, serves a critical and vital gap in the public's information needs and we therefore, strongly urge the Nevada State Library to reconsider this decision.

Thank you and sincerely,
=====================

As someone who participates in government virtual reference, I can assure our readers that having stuff online is NOT the same as being able to lay your digital fingers on it. Doubly so when that stuff isn't actually online.

As someone who used to run a state's document program, I can assure our readers that without someone whose primary role is state publications, a lot of stuff will fall through the cracks. This is based on the realization that a fair amount falls through the cracks even when there is dedicated staff.

Ian and Lisa didn't say whether the docs duties currently assigned to the position were going to be parceled out to others or be eliminated. Either choice would be a bad one. Most libraries that I'm familiar with already have most librarians doing about two positions worth of work.

So if you care about government information, especially if you live in Nevada, I hope you will consider joining this letter writing campaign. If you're familiar with the Nevada State Library, it would help if you could suggest some alternative cuts OR some alternative funding sources.

Check out my cousin Gabriel Troy's artwork using government documents.

He says about this sculpture, "Federal Paperwork Burden": "I wanted to make these Government documents accessible and inaccessible at the same time. The books are fixed by tension without a back or shelf."

He also took pages from government documents and painted over them: "These pages were cut from documents pertaining to business, agriculture, industry, and domestic issues. I have added structures to house the information."