Today the NCAC joined a coalition of groups in supporting the PRIDE (Police Reporting of Information, Data and Evidence) Act, which seeks to create a database of police-involved violence.
After the Black Lives Matter protest movement drew renewed focus on police brutality, media outlets like the Washington Post and the Guardian conducted research projects that attempted to document fatal police shootings of civilians in the country.
Such efforts are considerably hampered by the fact that official recordkeeping is scarce, and many police departments refuse to release the relevant data.
The letter calls the PRIDE Act a "critical step" for accountability and transparency, and adds
Public access to comprehensive accurate information of this sort is essential to the meaningful exercise of the First Amendment rights to speech and to petition government for redress of grievances.
The letter was organized by OpenTheGovernment.org. You can read more about it here.