Improving the Freedom of Information Act Through the Office of Information Policy

Abstract

Government transparency is a modern expectation of the United States of America’s government operations. Information transparency can be found from presidential records to congressional hearings and can be found in places such as the Congressional Record, GPO databases and programs, and many other databases that house or link to government information. The Freedom of Information Act does well to ensure that citizens are able to stay informed and have the ability to request access to some federal agency information. In addition to this, the DOJ has the Office of Information Policy (OIP) that has set focus on continually improving the FOIA by launching an Open Government Initiative in 2010 and releasing three additional revisions by 2016. All plans continue to increasingly evolve the OIP, while dissecting the efficacy of the Open Government Initiatives across agencies that are required to disseminate information to the public. Exploration of dissemination of information relating to the OIP and the prevalence of access issues are discussed.