Washington Post Ombudsman: Reform FOIA
Deborah Powell, the Washington Post ombudsman, writes "Without access to records, people cannot hold government accountable. One of
the most important avenues for that on the federal level is the Freedom of Information
Act (FOIA), now in the midst, I hope, of reform.
The law is 40 years old and has always had its problems. But getting
documents has become harder as backlogs of requests have grown longer, and when
documents do arrive they are often incomplete or censored. If you talk to FOIA
professionals in federal agencies, they will tell you that the law was an
"unfunded mandate" and that there has never been the staffing or funding to
implement it properly."
Read entire column in the Washington Post