On Aug. 3, the Senate passed the OPEN Government Act of 2007 (S. 849) by unanimous consent. The House passed similar legislation in March.

The bill was favorably reported out of the Senate Judiciary Committee April 12, but Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) placed a hold on it. Kyl and the Justice Department had voiced several problems with the bill. After negotiations between Kyl and the bill's co-sponsors, Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and John Cornyn (R-TX), Congress moved to institute several important reforms to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) process.

The mounting problems regarding FOIA are well-documented. The Coalition of Journalists for Open Government's report Waiting Game: FOIA Performance Hits New Lows found that even though FOIA requests were down in 2005, the backlog of unanswered requests rose from 20 percent of total requests made in 2004 to 31 percent in 2005. In addition to the increase in unanswered requests, requesters had to wait longer for replies.

In response to increasing pressure to relieve agency backlogs and improve FOIA procedures, President George W. Bush issued Executive Order 13392 on Dec. 14, 2005. The order, though, did little to relieve agency backlogs. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently stated, "Despite increasing the numbers of requests processed, many agencies did not keep pace with the volume of requests that they received."

On March 14, by a vote of 308-117, the House passed the Freedom of Information Act Amendments of 2007 (H.R. 1309).

The Senate and House bills reaffirm the 20-day response requirement and impose penalties on agencies that fail to meet the requirement. They create a FOIA ombudsman at the National Archives to serve as a resource for the public in requesting documents and to exercise oversight of FOIA compliance. Additionally, the bills offer a needed correction and expansion of access to attorney's fees for those forced to hire lawyers and pursue information disclosure in court after agencies unjustly deny requests. Finally, the OPEN Government Act restores the presumption of disclosure under FOIA that was eliminated by a memorandum then-Attorney General John Ashcroft issued soon after 9/11.

The bills are expected to go to conference after the August recess to resolve differences between the two pieces of legislation.