Shows
Lights Out MassPulling Back the Curtain on Government Secrecy (with Todd Wallack)Todd Wallack, an investigative journalist with more than two decades of experience in the media, started out in a small Ohio newsroom, later rose to the famed Spotlight team at The Boston Globe, and then moved to WBUR. Wallack’s name is synonymous with public records reporting in Massachusetts. His work has led to numerous precedent-setting lawsuits against government agencies that tried to keep information — like the names of police officers arrested for drunk driving — from the public.For the ninth episode of Lights Out Mass, we nerd out with Wallack about his never-ending quest to reveal storie...2023-11-131h 06
Lights Out MassOne Brother’s Fight for the Future of Police Transparency (with Eric Mack)On November 22, 2021, Fall River police officer Chelsea Campellone shot and killed 30-year-old Anthony Harden in his bedroom. Since then, Harden’s brother, Eric Mack, has been fighting for access to the investigative records that could shed some light on what happened that night.For the eighth episode of Lights Out Mass, we talk with Mack about his lingering questions and suspicions about the shooting, his lawsuit to force the Bristol County District Attorney’s Office to release more records, the important ramifications the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court’s interpretation of a 2020 police reform law will have for transp...2023-10-1859 min
Lights Out MassBook Challenges in MassachusettsThe seventh episode of Lights Out Mass is just in time for Banned Books Week!We talk about how libraries are awesome, Jeff’s new project to uncover all book challenges at public libraries and schools throughout Massachusetts, how bigots — including Rayla Campbell, the former Mass GOP candidate for secretary of the commonwealth — have been using concerns about protecting children from sexual abuse as cover for their bigotry, and proposed legislation that would ban book bans.If you enjoyed this podcast, please subscibe for future episodes! You can find us on Substack, Apple, Spotify, and YouTub...2023-10-041h 04
Lights Out Mass100,000 Documents and Counting (with Nathan Story)Lights Out Mass is a podcast about government transparency — or the lack thereof — in Massachusetts. Hosted by Andrew Quemere of The Mass Dump and Jeff Raymond of MassTransparency.For the sixth episode, we speak with Nathan Story, the programmer and records aficionado behind State Reference — a huge, searchable collection of Massachusetts public records that will soon prove to be an indispensable resource for journalists and researchers.We discuss Nathan’s old project, Woke Windows, and how it led him to conceive State Reference, the importance of machine-readable text and other seemingly stodgy technical details, how Nathan u...2023-09-201h 10
Lights Out MassThe Incredible Shrinking Police Complaint DatabaseLights Out Mass is a podcast about government transparency — or the lack thereof — in Massachusetts. Hosted by Andrew Quemere of The Mass Dump and Jeff Raymond of Mass Transparency.For the fifth episode of Lights Out Mass, we discuss the Massachusetts Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) Commission’s new statewide database of complaints against police officers, how the commission left out most of the data, and cohost Jeff Raymond’s tireless efforts to release the full data using the state public records law.If you enjoyed this podcast, please subscibe for future episodes! You can find...2023-09-1355 min
Lights Out Mass“We Might Actually Be Living in Hell” (with Luke O’Neil)Lights Out Mass is a podcast about government transparency — or the lack thereof — in Massachusetts. Hosted by Andrew Quemere of The Mass Dump and Jeff Raymond of Mass Transparency.For the fourth episode of Lights Out Mass, we speak with Luke O’Neil, the independent journalist behind the bleak, irreverent, and hilarious newsletter Welcome to Hell World. We discuss the death of DigBoston (and local journalism in general), what’s new in Hell World, O’Neil’s new short story collection, and his love for the band R.E.M.If you enjoyed this podcast, please subsc...2023-09-0445 min
Lights Out Mass“It’s Gaslighting”: Governor Healey and Public Records (with Maura Healey)Lights Out Mass is a podcast about government transparency — or the lack thereof — in Massachusetts. Hosted by Andrew Quemere of The Mass Dump and Jeff Raymond of Mass Transparency.The third episode is all about Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey and her approach to public records requests. Although the governor is exempt from the public records law, Healey said shortly before taking office that she would comply with it anyway. However, that promise didn’t last long. Laugh along with us as we listen to Healey try to explain her, uh... evolution on this issue. We also discuss propos...2023-08-2353 min
Lights Out MassRemote Access to Public Meetings (with Laura Kiesel)Lights Out Mass is a podcast about government transparency — or the lack thereof — in Massachusetts. Hosted by Andrew Quemere of The Mass Dump and Jeff Raymond of Mass Transparency.In our second episode, we interview journalist Laura Kiesel about the importance of remote access to public meetings for people with disabilities and the difficulties she’s encountered when requesting accommodations from Arlington, the town where she lives. We also discuss proposed legislation that would require hybrid meetings and the opposition from local officials, who say they prefer “flexibility” to “mandates.”If you enjoyed this podcast, please subscib...2023-08-1650 min
Lights Out MassIntroducing Lights Out MassWelcome to Lights Out Mass — a new podcast about government transparency in Massachusetts hosted by Andrew Quemere of The Mass Dump and Jeff Raymond of Mass Transparency.In our first episode, we introduce ourselves, talk about how public records can be used to investigate police misconduct, and weigh in on whether Donald Trump’s criminal trials should be televised.If you enjoyed this podcast, please subscibe for future episodes! You can find us on Substack, Apple, Spotify, and YouTube.You can find links discussed in this podcast here: https://andrewqmr.substack.com/p/podc...2023-08-0959 min