Transparency News 7/12/13

Jonnie R. Williams Sr., a corporate executive whose gifts to Gov. Bob McDonnell and his family are under public scrutiny, offered a free flight to Florida for top Virginia health officials to evaluate research involving a dietary supplement produced by his company, Star Scientific Inc. Secretary of Health and Human Resources William A. Hazel Jr. said he declined the trip offer, made nearly three years ago, for a flight to visit the Roskamp Institute, a research organization in Sarasota, Fla., that has worked with Star on potential application of its products for treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. Hazel said Williams asked him to extend the invitation to then-Health Commissioner Karen Remley, who the secretary said also declined.
Times-Dispatch

Former Franklin County Sheriff Ewell Hunt entered an Alford plea on Thursday to a misconduct charge and acknowledged that he made mistakes on the day that a deputy killed a woman. Hunt was accused of failing to warn other authorities that former deputy Jonathan Agee planned to kill his ex-wife, Jennifer Agee. Media outlets reported that Hunt entered his plea in Franklin County Circuit Court. He had been convicted of the misdemeanor charge in General District Court in September but appealed the verdict to Circuit Court.
Times-Dispatch

The latest draft of Albemarle County’s Comprehensive Plan is now available online, county officials announced Thursday. According to county staff, the plan will continue to be revised and updated over the next few days, though no changes will affect the substance of the plan.
Daily Progress

Claudia Cruise – Occoquan’s longtime clerk and then town manager – has resigned. Cruise said since she started working for the town in 1999 as town clerk, her in-office hours have been from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. However, with meetings and working evenings and some weekends, she routinely had been working more than 40 hours. The Occoquan Town Council decided recently to keep town hall open until 5 p.m., and wanted Cruise there until closing as part of her normal duties. “I felt it was demeaning and unfair to expand my in-office hours without an increase in pay, therefore I submitted my resignation,” she said.
InsideNOVA.com

Ashland’s town clerk is retiring, sort of. Lois Smith, town clerk, retired from her full-time job but will stay on as clerk of council.  She has worked for the town in various capacities since 1992. Meeting July 2, Ashland Town Council thanked Smith for her years of service to the town and presented her with a resolution, but not without some goodhearted teasing. “Lois, could you call the roll for that resolution?” Mayor Faye Prichard asked.
Herald-Progress

National Stories

The government has decided to hold off on distributing information about livestock and poultry farmers that has been sought by environmental groups who are concerned about water pollution. The American Farm Bureau Federation and the National Pork Producers Council had sued to block the release of information such as personal addresses, phone numbers and e-mail addresses, and a federal judge in Minneapolis will now take up the issue.
Minneapolis Star Tribune

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management this week identified some companies seeking to drill public lands and minerals included in future oil and gas lease sales. BLM records released under the federal Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, show that Tracker Services LLC nominated parcels of land in Bent County, and an individual, Kathryn J. Reese, nominated parcels in Huerfano County that will be included in the November BLM oil and gas lease auction. The BLM did not identify the nominator of a parcel of Weld County land that will be included in the auction.
The Coloradoan

A New York appeals court has ruled that a local newspaper and its reporter were not liable for defamation despite incorrectly reporting that a school teacher collected money from students for a “slush fund” used to buy an air conditioner for the faculty. In the unsigned ruling, the Brooklyn-based Second Department, Appellate Division of the New York Supreme Court stated that as a private figure engaged in a matter of public concern, the school teacher needed to prove the newspaper acted “in a grossly irresponsible manner” that ignored traditional newsgathering practices. The court essentially reversed its own six-year-old decision to deny summary judgment dismissal of a suit filed by the teacher, Gerard Matovcik, against the Village Beacon Record and reporter Peter C. Mastrosimone. –
Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press

Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin is claiming an executive privilege to hide records that reveal political considerations behind her decisions on state policy.  Included would be documents telling Fallin "who might be supportive of certain policy agendas in the legislature, both now and in the future, whether such support would exist after an upcoming election, and whether facts exist to help persuade the legislatures and others to support the governor's agenda," according to the formal response to an Open Records Act lawsuit against the governor.  The Lost Ogle, represented by the ACLU of Oklahoma, is challenging Fallin's claim that executive and deliberative process privileges permit her to withhold 100 pages of advice from "senior executive branch officials" on the creation of a state health insurance exchange.
FOI Oklahoma

Jeramie Shemonia spent months trying to find a job and land an apartment. Some interviews went very well for the 18-year-old, but then weeks passed without a return phone call. Shemonia was shocked to find out later that a quick computer search of his criminal background repeatedly shut the door before he had a chance to tell his story. More than a year ago, an alcohol-related incident with a roommate ended in three felony charges. Shemonia pleaded guilty to one minor assault count and the others were dismissed. In the future, a new state law will limit public access to nonviolent crime records for 16- and 17-year-olds. It’s part of a comprehensive legislative effort to get offenders such as Shemonia past a permanent roadblock that often leads back to a jail cell.
Star Tribune

Editorials/Columns

Times-Dispatch: Speaking about today’s announcement, Governor McDonnell said: “Jonnie Williams maintains a strong Virginia presence, and this major investment is great news for me and my local economy. These investments will produce major benefits for the McDonnell family that will enable the McDonnells to continue to grow and thrive in the Commonwealth.”

Roanoke Times: As the water around him gets deeper, Gov. Bob McDonnell can’t wait for a lifeboat to rescue him from a swirling cesspool of scandal. For the sake of his own credibility and for the state he leads, the governor needs to paddle his way to dry land and explain himself.

News Leader: We take no pleasure in acknowledging that Gov. Bob McDonnell is rumored to be on the brink of resignation. Once considered a possible Romney running mate, he more recently was the governor who achieved what his predecessors could not — a much-needed transportation bill passed in the hyper-partisan General Assembly. McDonnell was, we believed, a good man and a not-bad governor, despite overreaching on abortion legislation. Now his rising star has fallen with alarming, sad speed. And for what? Has he really become Virginia’s first governor to endure parallel state and federal investigations just so he could drive big-donor Jonnie Williams’ Ferrari from Smith Mountain Lake to the Executive Mansion, wear a Williams-purchased Rolex, and get assistance paying for his daughters’ weddings and loans to help pay mortgages he couldn’t cover himself?

Kerry Dougherty, Virginian-Pilot: We need help. We can’t control ourselves. According to Thursday’s Pilot, that’s essentially what some self-serving Virginia politicians are saying as they try to capitalize on a tawdry gubernatorial-gift scandal that’s unfolding in Richmond. We need stricter laws to stop us from taking gifts, they say. Better rules about reporting the loot we collect. Obviously. Problem is, the pols who can’t say no are the same ones who make the laws. What are the chances they’ll ever pass meaningful legislation to end the Old Dominion’s take-as-much-as-you-want-just-report-it policy?

Los Angeles Times: When Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. was asked about the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court during his confirmation hearings, he replied: "It's not what we usually think of when we think of a court." And he was absolutely right. As Roberts noted, most Americans think of a court as open to the public, where "lawyers argue, and it's subject to the glare of publicity. And the judges explain their decision to the public and they can examine them." But the federal FISA court — created by Congress in 1978 to rule on requests for surveillance orders against agents in the U.S. — meets entirely in secret and seldom makes its rulings public. Though most Americans have little idea what it does, the FISA court is extremely influential.