Tennessee officials were surprised to learn that its state retirement system owned over 7,000 shares of stock in a real estate investment trust that provides capital for the medical marijuana industry. While the state sold those shares, citing “policy implications,” recent Securities and Exchange Commission filings show that Tennessee remains invested in other substances that, while legal, have major health policy implications.

In the only faceoff known to the field of FOIA, we pit 64 federal Freedom of Information Act offices against each other to win the ultimate prize in competitive records requesting, that most lofty label: Most Responsive Agency.

The Securities and Exchange Commission receives thousands of FOIA requests each year - over 13,000 during the last one - and yet they managed to walk away the winner of MuckRock’s annual FOIA March Madness competition for the second year running. Other departments, though, have also provided some sort of response, and they’ve done so with variation; we’ll take a look at some of those differences here.

Each year, dozens of private prison contracts come up for re-bid. Help MuckRock’s Private Prison Project by letting us know about the contract debate near you.

Time moves at a different pace in the current FOI universe, and in keeping with tradition, we’re wrapping up our annual race to the completed request, FOIA March Madness 2018, well past the 20-day mark.