Burgard |
Robinson |
In partnership with journalists and public-policy advocates throughout the region, Northeastern has established the New England First Amendment Center to focus public attention on the increase in government efforts to restrict access to public records and meetings.
The university-based center is a joint undertaking of the New England First Amendment Coalition and Northeastern’s School of Journalism, with assistance from the university’s Kitty and Michael Dukakis Center for Urban and Regional Policy.
Alarmed at the growing difficulties faced by citizens, journalists, and public-policy advocates in gaining access to the workings of government at all levels, the coalition has selected Northeastern as its academic research partner because of the university’s reputation for sleeves-rolled-up involvement in important issues.
The First Amendment Center will offer a wealth of information for citizens, journalists, and public-policy organizations that depend on open access to government. It will continually update its website with news about public-access and First Amendment issues from across New England and around the nation. It will maintain a hotline to advise citizens seeking public documents and will conduct original research into issues related to government transparency. The center will also host seminars for journalists, municipal officials, and lawmakers on public-records statutes and open-meeting laws.
In addition, the center will maintain a blog with regular contributions written by members of the New England First Amendment Coalition, as well as First Amendment specialists and Northeastern faculty members. The website and blog can be found at <northeastern.edu/firstamendment>.
“There is a need for greater awareness of the importance of freedom of information in a free society,” says Tom Heslin, president of the New England First Amendment Coalition and interim executive editor at the Providence Journal. “The right to know is as essential to a functioning democracy as the right to vote. The New England First Amendment Coalition, in partnership with the center at Northeastern, will be a force for keeping the First Amendment and freedom of information at the top of the public-policy agenda in New England.”
“With the center, Northeastern and the New England First Amendment Coalition will take the lead in creating public awareness, increasing public involvement, and coordinating public action to guarantee unfettered access to the deliberations of government agencies and the public records that are so critical to an informed citizenry,” says Stephen Burgard, director of Northeastern’s School of Journalism.
Both Heslin and Burgard say the center’s advocacy role should provide critical help at a time when many financially strapped news organizations have fewer resources to ensure government agencies adhere to public-records and open-meeting laws.
Overseeing the work of the new center is Walter V. Robinson, LA’74, H’05, Northeastern’s Distinguished Professor of Journalism and former director of the Boston Globe’s Pulitzer Prize–winning investigative-reporting group, the Spotlight Team.