Randy Evans of Des Moines is the executive director of the Iowa Freedom of Information Council, a 40-year-old nonprofit education and advocacy organization that works for better open government and government accountability.
Evans took over the role with the FOI Council in October 2015 after a 40-year career with The Des Moines Register. He joined the Register in 1974. first as a news reporter and then in various editing roles, including state editor, metro editor, news editor and assistant managing editor. He was editor of the Register’s opinion pages during his final four years with the newspaper.
He began his newspaper career at 16, working for his hometown newspaper, the Bloomfield Democrat. After graduating from the University of Iowa, he spent two years as the editor of the Albia Union-Republican and Monroe County News, weekly newspapers in Albia.
He retired from the Register in December 2014 and began writing a weekly column on government and politics for the Bloomfield Democrat. The column now also appears regularly in six to eight other newspapers and news websites.
Evans is frequently asked to ‘spout off’ about off about government transparency, government secrecy, the First Amendment, or the state of journalism.
Evans has coached young journalists each fall through an Iowa Newspaper Association program. He spoke to a remote gathering of Midwest newspaper reporters/editors in 2021 on writing lessons learned in 40+ years of newspaper work.
He and his wife, Sue, have two daughters.
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Topics
KISS (Keep it Simple, Stupid)
Don’t Give Your Readers an Excuse to Quit Reading
Evans will also appear on panels