[OSGeodata] FOIA and VMAP1 anyone?

[Allan Doyle]

I seem to recall that there's something "different" about vmap1. This  
article alludes to it
http://www.profsurv.com/archive.php?issue=78&article=1094

"One of the exemptions removes documents from FOIA coverage that fall  
under other legislation. Landsat data falls into that category and  
was thus sold at far higher rates than FOIA would allow. NIMA's  
release of the high resolution VMAP-1 world data set (the replacement  
for VMAP-0, an enhanced version of the Digital Chart of the World) is  
thwarted by an exemption. VMAP-0 was made public, but NIMA argued  
that VMAP-1 included material from other governments, which the  
agency argued took it out of FOIA's reach via a different exemption."

I think it's quite likely that it could be hung up on intergovernment  
agreements and thus could be a harder nut to crack than we would like.

Not that we should not try, but I think the risk of not getting legal  
fees back are higher than normal FOIA attempts might lead you to  
believe.

	Allan

On Jul 7, 2006, at 15:03, Chris Holmes wrote:

> Hey all, was wondering if anyone here might be excited about doing  
> Freedom of Information requests and legal action on full VMAP1  
> datasets?
>
> http://www.mapability.com/index1.html?http&&&www.mapability.com/ 
> info/vmap1_index.html
>
> Has an introduction, if you don't know basically it's 1:250,000  
> scale vectors for the whole world.  Only portions have been  
> released, and NGA ignores FOIA requests for access to more.  I have  
> a good friend who's a lawyer who recently set up a non-profit legal  
> institution to do, among other things, FOIA actions.  He's pretty  
> excited about going after this, and with some more information  
> feels we have a good chance of winning it.  You take them to court  
> and if successful the court demands that the data be handed over.
>
> So my question is, is this something that the geodata committee  
> could get behind?  We may be able to get fee waivers on the  
> requests if we can show that it's an organization helping to  
> 'understand government' or some such, basically we can pretty  
> easily spin what we are in to something that could get a fee  
> waiver.  And indeed if we have the apparatus to distribute the data  
> once we get it then it also may be easier.
>
> He's willing to give us a very good discount on time spent, and the  
> cool thing is that if we win, which we should, then the government  
> will pay all his attorney fees.  And in that case any money he  
> takes from us will be returned.  I was thinking we could set up a  
> fund, use pledgebank or something for the initial money, and then  
> if/when we win that money goes back in to more FOIA actions.   
> Perhaps go after things like NYCMap, things at a more regional  
> level that have really nice data (we don't all have organizations  
> like MassGIS :( ).
>
>  Chris
>
> -- 
> Chris Holmes
> The Open Planning Project
> http://topp.openplans.org
> <cholmes.vcf>

-- 
Allan Doyle
+1.781.433.2695
adoyle at eogeo.org