Also available on the site is a collection of free, searchable/sortable/filterable bill tracking RSS feeds as well as the Legislature’s 2008 attendance [...]]]> Today, Open Government Foundation, Inc., announced the availability of voting records for the New York State Assembly and Senate from 1995 to June 12, 2009, with the launch of its beta site NewYork.OpenLegislation.org.

Also available on the site is a collection of free, searchable/sortable/filterable bill tracking RSS feeds as well as the Legislature’s 2008 attendance records for the Floors and Committees in PDF format. New information is added on an ongoing basis as records are released from the Legislature.

“With so much upheaval in Albany and Senators walking a tight rope where every vote matters, we believe NewYork.OpenLegislation.org has arrived just in time to make a difference and show you how every representative’s vote affects you and your family,” said Benjamin Kallos, one of the co-Founders.

NewYork.OpenLegislation.org was created in response to the need for publicly available information about the legislative process and the growing outcry ignited by the Brennan Center for Justice in its 2004 report, The New York State Legislative Process: An Evaluation and Blueprint for Reform. In its 2008 update, Still Broken: New York State Legislative Reform 2008 Update, the Center denounced the secrecy of the legislative process and criticized the unavailability of important legislative information, which can often be obtained only through burdensome, costly requests under Freedom of Information Law. In response to the Brennan Center’s specific request that committees “publish all of their work on the Internet, including attendance records, vote records, and debate transcripts,” Open Government Foundation stepped in to fill the hole that the Legislature has left gaping for years.

“In an open, free democracy it shouldn’t be up to the legislature to decide what information is important enough to be released to the citizens for free,” said co-founder Thom Neale. “Instead, all relevant data should be released in its entirety, and the citizens should be empowered to decide what information they will consume, when they will consume it, how, where and why.”

Open Government Foundation, Inc. (“OGF”) is a New York State not-for-profit devoted to making government transparent, accountable and open by making legislative information available for free over the internet. “Our mission is simple: wherever the state legislature neglects to release critical legislative data to the public, whether through apathy, indifference, or impracticability, we will step in and use every means available to release the information for free ourselves,” added Thom Neale.

The organization is seeking grants and private donations to fulfill its mandate to acquire legislative documents and provide them online to the public for free– ensuring that no one else will have to pay for them in the future. To join the team or advisory board, or to contribute or request a specific document, please visit: NewYork.OpenLegislation.org. Donations are not yet tax deductible.