OpenTheGovernment.org's 2008 Secrecy Report Card, released Sept. 9, explored numerous indicators of government secrecy and found that continued expansion of secrecy across the federal government occurred in 2007. The report is the group's fifth such annual publication; all five reports have discovered continual poor performance by the federal government in permitting public access to government information.

The 2008 report also noted that while secrecy worsened in the executive branch, the 110th Congress pushed forward with new legislation to increase government openness and accountability. In particular, Congress passed and the president signed into law amendments to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) intended to strengthen the law.

The report found that in 2007, the government received nearly 22 million requests for records under FOIA, which was almost a two percent increase from the number of requests received the previous year. These increases seem to be mostly due to the fact that the Social Security Administration and the Veterans Administration classify individuals' requests for information as FOIA requests.

The report also found that the 25 departments and agencies responsible for the bulk of FOIA requests continued to carry significant backlogs of these requests. According to Patrice McDermott, Director of OpenTheGovernment.org, "These trends indicate that citizens will have to wait even longer to know what their government is doing."

In 2007, there was a slight increase in the number of original classification decisions, after two consecutive years of declines. At the same time, there was an almost 13 percent increase in the number of derivative classifications. Derivative classifications replicate originally classified information in different ways and formats. The growing number of derivative classifications reflects the continuing increase in original classification and, according to ISOO (Information Security Oversight Office), the use of classified e-mail, webpages, blogs, wikis, and so on.

In addition to the time that secrecy costs the public in waiting longer and longer for FOIA requests, classification costs taxpayers money. The report estimated the government spent almost $200 to maintain secrets for every dollar the government spent declassifying documents, a five percent increase over the 2006 ratio. Even though the government spent the same amount of money on declassification as it did in 2006, the number of pages declassified declined. Also troubling was that the annual decline in original classification decisions being assigned automatic 10-year declassification status has continued: 64 percent of such decisions were slated for automatic declassification in 2005, but only 61 percent were so designated in 2006, and just 57 percent in 2007.

The report also tracks data on the following indicators to help present a complete picture of the state of access to federal government information:

• Use of state secrets privilege
• Issuance of National Security Letters
• Assertions of executive privilege
• Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court Orders
• Secrecy orders for patents
• Use of presidential signing statements
• Whistleblower awards for saved money
• Competition of federal contracts
• Closed Federal Advisory Committee meetings

"The current administration continues to refuse to be held accountable to the public," said McDermott. "In recent years, polls have shown that a growing number of Americans believe the federal government is secretive — terrible news for our democracy. Until we restore openness and accountability to the federal government, it will be impossible to win back the public's trust."

OpenTheGovernment.org is a coalition of over 70 consumer and good government groups, librarians, environmentalists, labor leaders, journalists, and others working together to reduce governmental secrecy and promote openness. The coalition focuses on making the federal government a more open place in order to make the public safer, strengthen public trust in government, and support democratic principles. OMB Watch is a member of the coalition.