Publication Items

The Government Printing Office web site apparently took down the publication after discovery of the mistake -- but the entire report is still available on the site of the Federation of American Scientists' Project on Government Secrecy.

The Mine Safety and Health Administration still denies FOIA requests, including one filed in Oct. 2008 by mine safety attorney Tony Oppegard for some witness statements.

By MIKE DUNNE

Two members of the Society of Environmental Journalists honored recently for their investigative reporting efforts say that digging through records and old-fashioned shoe-leather reporting helped them make good stories great.

Ken Ward Jr. of The Charleston Gazette was the winner of the Scripps Howard Edward Meeman Award for environmental reporting – the third time he was so honored. His winning work focused on a coal silo permit that should not have been issued and was revoked thanks to his reporting.

By MIKE DUNNE

Ever wonder what lies beneath your feet – what's down there in the ground on which we walk?

The Toledo Blade's Tom Henry has an editor, Jim Wilhelm, who asked that question and the result was an interesting look at what the government is doing – or not doing – to clean up gasoline spills from leaky underground tanks.