LibrarianActivist.org

Found in the Internet Resources Newsletter, a Freedom of Information Disclosure Log for the Scottish Government. (with a funny request in May: “Request for details relating to the value and payment of wine stored at the Scottish Parliament”). A quick search found the very interesting UK Freedom of Information Act Blog, (I would love to see something like this in Canada!) with a list of all the disclosure logs in the UK. (there’s also a funny request at the Cabinet Office: “Documents relating to the Prime Minister’s appearance on the American cartoon series, the Simpsons in 2003″).

From an earlier post about supposedly “pro-palestinian” photos that were taken down from a library exhibit in Côte-St-Luc in Montreal, the CLA has issued a press release asking the Côte-St-Luc council members to reverse its decision to remove the “offending” pictures.

While CLA respects that a public institution is free to set its own policies, CLA notes the library deemed the exhibit worthy enough to display in the first place. In doing so, it was quite properly fulfilling its role as a centre for freedom of expression, intellectual discussion and debate within its community. It was doing what a library should.

CLA urges the Côte-St-Luc council to support its library as a place where an open exchange of ideas and opinions are encouraged, rather than a place where criticism is dealt with by censorship, by re-opening the full exhibit.

Two great votes in Congress:

• “the House passed Congressman Sanders legislation to amend Section 215 of the Patriot Act in order to keep the federal government from accessing Americans’ reading records without a traditional search warrant. ” (Link to story)
• The American Chemical Society has been putting pressure on Congress to cut funding to the NIH’s freely accessible PubChem database. The “House of Representatives’ Appropriations Committee approved the annual NIH budget with only the slightest admonishment that both parties work together.” (Link to story).

Remy Chevalier is trying to get his Environmental Library Fund, an environmental library, up and running in South Norwalk, CT. Remy has been

collecting excess review materials from magazine editors and publishers, from environmental companies, researchers and writers. Storing them in [his] home, attic, garage, cellar, etc… as well as in many other people’s homes, attic, garages etc… in the hopes of one day being able to find a suitable public space where the collection would finally be made accessible to the general public.

If you’re interested in helping out, check out his business plan. Here’s a story with more info. [thanks chris]

If you want to meet the great people over at Radical Reference, they are holding a bunch of events at the ALA conference at the end of June. There will be bike outings and zine readings and even some church going!