Connecticut Foundation for Open Government Announces Winners of its Fifth Annual Pearlman Freedom of Information Award

The Connecticut Foundation for Open Government (CFOG) has announced that a Connecticut Mirror investigative reporter, a town administrator and a Hartford lawyer have been selected to receive the fifth annual Mitchell W. Pearlman Freedom of Information Award.

The award honors government officials, journalists and residents of Connecticut who have made significant efforts to foster transparency in government, disclose information vital to the public and ensure that state residents can see their government at work. It is named for Mitch Pearlman, the founding executive director of Connecticut’s Freedom of Information Commission and an international expert on government transparency, privacy and the First Amendment.

The honorees are journalist Ginny Monk, Ellington Town Administrator Matthew Reed and Attorney Mark J. Sommaruga, a partner at Pullman & Comley.

CFOG is also recognizing Aaron Bayer, Special Counsel and co-chair of the Education Practice Group of the distinguished law firm of Wiggins and Dana, and Jamie P. Horsley, a research scholar in law and Senior Fellow of the Paul Tsai China Center at Yale Law School, as special Pearlman honorees.

The award recipients will be honored at a reception on Wednesday, Oct. 7 from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at the Mark Twain House & Museum at 351 Farmington Ave. in Hartford. Tickets are $40 per person and can be purchased at https://bit.ly/Pearlman26  or by mailing a check with the number of desired tickets to Connecticut Foundation for Open Government, 423 Old Post Road, Tolland, CT 06084. The event will feature complimentary hors d’oeuvres, wine, beer and soda.

Monk is being honored for her numerous stories published since she moved to Connecticut in 2021 that have made a difference in the lives of residents of the state and that have humanized issues that had often been overlooked. She shared in the 2026 Pulitzer Prize for local reporting for “On the Hook,” an investigative series that made extensive use of public records and the FOI Act to expose the lax standards and predatory practices that allowed the towing industry to victimize many low-income residents. Monk is known for approaching her work with empathy and respect for the people she is covering.

Her reporting is also innovative: in conjunction with “Notice to Quit,” a 2022 series that examined the effects of eviction on children, she produced a set of coloring pages and a book to help explain evictions to children. The Pearlman judges also noted Monk’s 2023 moving coverage of the forces in a Hartford mother’s life that may have contributed to her toddler son dying from a fall from their apartment window.

“Ginny is an outstanding journalist who makes this state a better place to live,” Andrew Brown, a CFOG board member and CT Mirror investigative reporter, wrote in nominating Monk.

In the Public Official category, CFOG is honoring Reed, a retired South Windsor police chief, for his decades of advocacy for government transparency and accountability while serving in key positions in state and local government. When it comes to requests for public records, Reed’s mantra is, “When in doubt, give it out.”

In the mid-1990s, Reed was one of the first Connecticut police public information officers to routinely send out press releases to journalists by email. As social media evolved, he became one of the first police officials to release information to the media and the public on Facebook and Twitter. These steps enabled journalists to break stories quickly while knowing the information had come from a reliable source. In 2014, Reed received the Bice Clemow Award from the Connecticut Council on Freedom of Information for his leadership as chief and his commitment to “put out as much info as possible” to the public about crime in his community. He also previously served on CFOG’s board.

Since retiring as chief in 2015, Reed worked as an assistant director of public safety at the University of Connecticut and spent three years as a staff attorney, hearing officer and ombudsman at the state Freedom of Information Commission. FOI compliance was also among his duties as an attorney for the state Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection. He has served as Ellington’s top appointed official since 2023.

In the General Public category, CFOG is honoring Sommaruga for his passion for Connecticut’s FOI law. While his legal expertise for the past 34 years has been broad, Sommaruga is widely recognized as an authority on the FOI Act. His most significant contribution to government transparency is his authorship of “Understanding the Connecticut’s Freedom of Information Act,” now in its sixth edition.

Published and distributed by Pullman & Comley and the Connecticut Association of Boards of Education, the book provides clear, practical guidance to public officials, agency members, attorneys, journalists and residents seeking to navigate the FOI Act’s complex requirements and exceptions. A self-described “FOIA nerd,” Sommaruga has devoted substantial time and effort to making Connecticut’s transparency law accessible and understandable.

Sommaruga has assisted the state FOI Commission in training public officials on the law, and as a former chair of the Media and the Law Section of the Connecticut Bar Association, he organized programs on the First Amendment, FOI and media law.

“His work has helped public agencies comply with their obligations while empowering residents to understand and exercise their right to observe government in action,” attorney Christopher Henderson, a CFOG board member, wrote in nominating Sommaruga for a Pearlman FOI Award.

Bayer is a former Deputy Attorney General of the state of Connecticut where he convinced many agency heads to comply with the state Freedom of Information Act rather than fight to keep matters secret.

A brilliant lawyer and a dedicated defender of the First Amendment and open government liberties, he was a founding director of the Connecticut Foundation for Open Government and served for many years as its vice president, always guiding the CFOG board through difficult issues.

He has also served on many nonprofit boards of directors, including as the chair of Connecticut Legal Services and a director of the Connecticut Public Affairs Network.

Among his many honors, he has won awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Freedom of Information Commission. He served on the Judicial Task Force on Public Access, established by the Connecticut Supreme Court to increase public access to the courts and chaired the Committee on Access to Judicial Proceedings, which recommended expanding media coverage of court proceedings.

Aaron Bayer is described as a legal superstar and a worthy recipient of the Mitchell Pearlman Freedom of Information Award for his many decades of service to CFOG, the FOI Commission and the cause of open government.

Horsley’s work revolves primarily around issues of administrative law, governance and regulatory reform, including promoting government transparency, public participation and government accountability.

She first visited the Connecticut Freedom of Information Commission decades ago with her students and visiting scholars to study the state’s unique system for administering and enforcing its FOI laws. Hooked on government access to information laws, she studies, writes and lectures about it throughout the world – from Asia to Latin America, from Africa to the European Union, as well as throughout the United States and Canada.

She shares her studies and insights with CFOG and the FOI staff, infusing all with an understanding of how other jurisdictions treat problems common to all democratic jurisdictions, such as using technology for “proactive disclosure” of information and in environmental data collection. She is now studying the benefits and potential pitfalls of artificial intelligence with respect to access to information and privacy laws.

Prior to joining Yale, she was a partner in the international law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison; commercial attaché in the U.S. embassies in Beijing and Manila; vice president of Motorola International, Inc.; and a consultant to The Carter Center’s China Village Elections Project. She was a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars for 2015-16.