Скачать или смотреть NFOIC Hall of Fame Ceremony

Four “Heroes of the 50 States,” representing Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, were inducted Sept. 30 into the National Freedom of Information Coalition’s State Open Government Hall of Fame, as the Class of 2021. The inductees have backgrounds in law, journalism and academia. The National Freedom of Information Coalition is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that promotes press freedom, litigation and legislative and administrative reforms that ensure open, transparent and accessible state and local governments. It was founded in 1989.

The State Open Government Hall of Fame recognizes long-term contributions of individuals to open government in their respective states. Induction recognizes the “long and steady effort to preserve and protect the free flow of information about state and local government that is vital to the public in a democracy.”

The 2021 inductees are:

Barbara Petersen, of Florida
During her 25-year tenure as president of Florida’s First Amendment Foundation, through analysis and advocacy, collaboration and litigation, attorney Barbara Petersen helped to shape Florida’s open government guarantees as among the most effective and respected in the nation. She worked closely with Florida editors to create Sunshine Sunday, which became Sunshine Week. When she retired from the First Amendment Foundation in 2019, she started work on the creation of a new open government watchdog, the Florida Center for Government Accountability, which gives citizens the necessary tools and information to engage government officials more effectively by helping them better understand what is happening in their local communities and the effect big money has on local politics.

Jane Briggs-Bunting, of Michigan
Jane Briggs-Bunting was a lifetime advocate for the First Amendment and open government. She started her career as a reporter at The Detroit Free Press, then taught journalism and media law at Oakland University and Michigan State University. In 2012, Briggs-Bunting founded Michigan’s statewide advocate for government transparency, the Michigan Coalition for Open Government. She received numerous awards throughout her career, including Journalist of the Year and later a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Society of Professional Journalists of Detroit; induction into the Michigan Journalism Hall of Fame; and the first recipient of the eponymous Jane Briggs-Bunting Transparency in Government Award from the Michigan Coalition for Open Government. Briggs-Bunting died of cancer March 23, 2021. She was 70.

Craig Staudenmaier, of Pennsylvania
Attorney Craig Staudenmaier has led the way for open government in Pennsylvania for decades. He helped spearhead media organizations’ efforts as they worked with legislators to develop what became Pennsylvania’s landmark Right to Know Law in 2008. Staudenmaier argued numerous precedent-setting open government cases, including three before the state Supreme Court. Thanks to Staudenmaier, Pennsylvanians won access to police files and court cases of civil disturbances and unsolved homicides, the Department of Education’s emails about the Jerry Sandusky molestation scandal at Penn State University, and records surrounding a settlement between the Public Utility Commission and an electric company over a power outage that hit more than 388,000 customers. Staudenmaier has volunteered as counsel for the Pennsylvania Freedom of Information Coalition since its founding in 2005.

Bill Lueders, of Wisconsin
Bill Lueders is editor of The Progressive and author of “An Enemy of the State,” the biography of the late editor of The Progressive, Erwin Knoll. Lueders was news editor at Isthmus, Madison’s alternative weekly, for 25 years, and won dozens of state and national awards. In 2011, he moved to the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism, where he became one of Wisconsin’s leading investigative reporters. He joined the staff of The Progressive in 2015, and was named editor in September 2018. He has been the President of the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council for two decades, and has been the driving force behind the Open Government Road Show and other efforts to educate the public in transparent governance.