I blogged last week on how open government laws can help people learn about both big things and little things when it comes to what their government is doing. Oftentimes, it's us professional journalist folks using the open government laws. But regular folks can use them, too, and some do -- and I wish more of them did.

Here's one example from just the other day. Some folks in Nacogdoches don't want a federal prison to be built in their town. So they've filed an open records request for correspondence, including e-mails, about the proposed prison. They've sent the requests to the city, the county, and the local economic development authority. (Hat tip to the Texas Prison Bid'ness blog, where we spotted this. The original story was from TV station KTRE.)

If you or someone you know is using the open government laws to find out more about what's going on in their town, we'd love to get a note from you. You can e-mail me -- I'm jennifer@texaswatchdog.org -- or just drop us a line in the comments section below.