Our Impact

Together with our coalition partners and allies we have:

• Forged organizations with different focuses and priorities into a broad coalition that has proven to be enormously effective in bringing about change.
• Created a blueprint for openness for improving government openness that was used extensively by the Obama transition team in 2009 to shape government policy.
• Pushed back against excessive national security secrecy and secret law.
• Set new expectations for open data to support accountability and for ending corruption, waste and fraud.
• Ensured passage of legislation to improve whistleblower protections.
• Worked closely with Congress and the Executive Branch to strengthen the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”), improve federal record keeping, reduce overclassification, and more.
• Pushed for greater accountability in federal spending.
• Set high standards for and push the Obama administration on its openness agenda.
• Ensured policy reforms are realized in practice
• Stopped hundreds of bad things from happening. Some examples include: Prevented agribusinesses from being able to claim privacy rights under the FOIA; Convinced the Smithsonian institution to adopt a public disclosure process; Stopped numerous legislative attempts to prevent information from being disclosed under the FOIA; Prevented the passage of legislation on “leaks” that would have chilled whistleblowers; Stopped a new, much broader level of classification.

We accomplish our goals by:

• Sharing Information and Expertise among our diverse coalition partners
• Bringing Advocates Together from across the political spectrum and issue areas  to work on issues of common concern
• Creating Space for Extended Discussion and consensus-building on how to overcome long-term or systemic challenges and put in place concrete plans
• Coordinating Advocacy and Education efforts to put plans into action.

Recent Year-End Reports

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012