"A new report from the Government Accountability Office elevates the problem of looming gaps in satellite weather data to a 'high risk' concern for the federal government."
"SIMI VALLEY, Calif. -- NASA has agreed to an 'excessive and unnecessarily costly cleanup' of a former rocket test facility near Los Angeles that was the site of a partial nuclear meltdown in 1959, the space agency's watchdog said Thursday."
Among those that haven't updated FOIA regs since before Congress enacted FOIA amendments in 2007 are USDA, National Transportation Safety Board, DoE, National Indian Gaming Commission, DoJ, Chemical Safety and Hazards Investigation Board, OMB (which claims responsibility for FOIA discipline), Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, Consumer Product Safety Commission, and DHHS.
A leaked draft of the replacement rule suggested Interior would leave handling of fracking data to the industry-run "FracFocus" project, which has come under criticism by environmental and watchdog groups for being hard to use and incomplete.
The United States, whose Minerals Management Service simply neglected to collect in-kind offshore oil royalties under President Bush, has yet to prove itself a paragon. Yet now a new Interior Department committee is poised to lecture other countries on how to do it right.
"This year, the Commerce Department will investigate the feasibility of a bicycle share program. The Agriculture Department's Risk Management Agency will redraw planting zone maps for the purposes of insuring nursery-grown plants. And the Department of Defense will scale down its fleet of gas-guzzling Humvees. These are all examples of steps federal agencies will take in 2013 in an effort to deal with the risks of future climate change. The Obama administration released its first climate change adaptation plans Thursday, as part of the annual sustainability reports."
"The United States will struggle to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to promised levels by 2020, a report from a prominent think tank warned this week, but the federal government, states and industry already have the means at their disposal to achieve such goals."
"The National Weather Service moved to fire one of its top managers Friday, four days after he was quoted in an article in The Washington Post lamenting that budget cuts and the threat of further reductions in March were forcing him to pare back a public safety service."
EPA had already released preliminary TRI data for the latest available year (2011), but its National Analysis makes for easier reporting as data is collated by state. It also offers analyses by industry sector and of toxics handling by collating the parent companies of each facility nationwide.
Sunshine Week is a great opportunity for journalists to do the most important part of the job: spotlighting the very news that government officials are uncomfortable about disclosing. The website includes examples of good freedom-of-information stories, permission-free cartoons, logos and icons, and many all-purpose story ideas.
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