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All Access
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Follow the bills we follow. VCOG’s annual bill chart is up and running
and will be updated daily throughout the legislative session.
Click here
Here are the actions taken by the FOIA subcommittee yesterday. But first, VCOG’S agenda bill — a different version of the same bill concept VCOG offered last session — is up for consideration in today’s Senate General Laws Committee, which meets a half-hour after the Senate floor session ends. Start here if you want to watch the meeting, and presumably to offer public comment. Unfortunately, the Senate makes this process much harder than the House does. The bill is SB 699.
Also, today at noon, Del. Jessica Anderson, who represents both VCOG and me personally, will introduce VCOG in conjunction with a resolution commending us on our 30TH ANNIVERSARY!!!! Tune in here.
Now, back to those House subcommittee FOIA bills:
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HB 313: Would let people who own property in Virginia, but who don’t live in the state, to nonetheless use FOIA as if they were citizens. TABLED AND SENT TO THE FOIA COUNCIL
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HB 346: Would exempt a government’s utility account number from disclosure (this does not include telephone numbers). PASSED
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HB 463: Would allow more members of a public body to meet together without triggering FOIA rules. CONTINUED TO 2027 AND SENT TO THE FOIA COUNCIL
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HB 644: Would create an exemption for the personal information of minors participating in state-sponsored internships. PASSED
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HB 709: Would exempt employee “home address, personal email address, and home and personal phone numbers” as part of their personnel file. STRICKEN FROM THE DOCKET
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Local
Amid inflation and rising costs, uncertainty surrounding federal and state funding and an assessment freeze that will pause the city’s annual real estate tax revenue increase, Richmond Public Schools Superintendent Jason Kamras recommended eliminating 46 jobs from RPS’ central office, delaying raises for staff, cutting summer school for kindergarten through 8th-grade students and ending the district’s online school offerings. RPS budget documents do not identify the job titles at risk of cuts. Asked what types of positions would be subject to layoffs, RPS spokesperson Alyssa Schwenk said officials could not “share specific titles, as that would be personally identifiable.” … Andrea Bryant, president of the Richmond Education Association — the union that represents RPS educators — said she was concerned about the impending staff reductions. … Kamras’ administration has not communicated with REA regarding what positions will be cut, she added, but individual staffers have reached out to the union about the reductions.
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Local
Blacksburg Town Council on Tuesday appointed Joel Goodhart and Andrew Kassoff to fill two vacancies created by recent resignations. Four of the five current members voted in favor of the appointments, with one member abstaining, citing concerns about the process. … At a previous public hearing, the selection process drew criticism from some residents, who said the appointments were made without public input and lacked transparency[.] Newly elected member Darryl Campbell echoed those concerns Tuesday. “I think it would be foolish to call today fair or successful,” he said. “The town has been very vocal about their lack of trust for town council,” Campbell added. “That’s something I heard all throughout the campaign, and part of the reason I ran was to provide some sort of transparency.” … Campbell pointed to a similar situation in Christiansburg last fall, when that town solicited applications, announced candidates, accepted public input and then voted on an interim appointment.
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Local
Arlington leaders say they are trying to lower the temperature in their sometimes-heated relationship with pro-Palestinian activists who appear at monthly County Board meetings. In recent months, activists have held private meetings with individual Board members, which Board Chair Matt de Ferranti and County Board member Julius “J.D.” Spain, Sr. said have been constructive. “You all and we have come a long way,” de Ferranti said at the County Board’s Jan. 24 meeting. It’s unclear if activists agree with this assessment. Speaker Kishori Mahulikar used the public-comment period that starts meetings to criticize Board members for sticking with previous rules that limit debate during that time. The rules adopted for 2026 kept a requirement that only one speaker could use the public-comment period to address an issue.
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Local
If you were a former mayor who was hired as a town manager and wanted to use ChatGPT to assist with your workload, how could AI help? It turns out for Purcellville’s interim town manager Kwasi Fraser, who is currently on paid administrative leave while awaiting court proceedings on two felony charges related to bid rigging, the answer is for pretty much everything. The Times-Mirror requested a transcript of all Fraser’s ChatGPT interactions on the town of Purcellville’s account, and we received a 552-page document.
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Nationwide
Police officers are being told to “be as vague as permissible” about why they are using the Flock surveillance system in order to not leak sensitive information via public records requests, according to records obtained using a public records request. The warning originated from a Houston-area police intelligence center that includes members of the FBI and ICE and suggests without evidence that people are using a website called HaveIBeenFlocked.com to “potentially retaliate against law enforcement.” The warnings were shared with 404 Media by researchers from Southerners Against Surveillance Systems and Infrastructure and Lucy Parsons Lab after our article about police unwittingly leaking the details of millions of surveillance targets nationwide due to public records redaction errors made by several Flock automated license plate reader system customers. This data was aggregated into a searchable tool called HaveIBeenFlocked.
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VCOG’s annual FOI awards nomination form is open.
Nominate your FOIA hero!
“Democracies die behind closed doors.” ~ U.S. District Judge Damon Keith, 2002
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