Transparency News, 12/2/20

The city of Charlottesville will have to pay Unite the Right organizer Jason Kessler’s court costs after failing to provide emails requested under the Freedom of Information Act in a timely manner. Kessler, the primary organizer of the 2017 white nationalist rally, has filed several lawsuits against the city in years past, mostly centered around alleged violations of his constitutional right to free speech. Though the city will have to pay an as-yet unknown sum, the result is only partially the outcome sought by Kessler, who argued that the city should have preserved text messages from former City Manager Maurice Jones. The lawsuit, filed Oct. 23 in Charlottesville General District Court, alleged that city spokesman and FOIA officer Brian Wheeler violated the law in 2019 by not providing Kessler with text messages and emails he requested from Jones, who was the city manager at the time of the rally. Judge Robert Downer said his court was not the proper venue for complaints against FOIA officers who do not properly preserve records and that he did not find that the city possessed the text messages at the time of the request. As for the requested emails, Downer said he did not find that they were knowingly or willfully denied to Kessler and, in the absence of any evidence of financial harm, he would only grant Kessler reimbursement for his court costs and the costs of any subpoenas he issued.
The Daily Progress

Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic this spring, Smithfield Town Council has shifted to conducting socially-distanced in person meetings — but hasn’t broadcast them online or on social media platforms. Mayor Carter Williams and one town council member said they feel that approach is working OK, while another council member said live streaming meetings is “something we should probably take a look at.” Although what the town is doing is perfectly OK, the absence of a public meeting live stream is a missed opportunity, said Megan Rhyne, executive director of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government. The nonprofit alliance promotes expanded access to local and state government records and meetings.
The Smithfield Times

 

If you’re following the coronavirus story closely, you’ve gotten used to checking lots of numbers. Information about cases, hospitalizations and deaths are readily available, broken down by state and county and updated daily. That doesn’t mean the information is current. “Even though the numbers are changing every day, those numbers can be from a lab report that’s several weeks old, as opposed to yesterday,” says Janet Hamilton, executive director of the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists. Public health spending had been in decline for years leading up to the pandemic, with spending on data and technology always a low priority. Now, when timely information about the spread of a deadly infectious disease is paramount, the public health system is not equipped to process it. “When you have a disease that moves with speed and intensity, the data needs to do the same and currently that is not happening,” Hamilton says. “We’ve neglected public health infrastructure for a long time,” says Brian Castrucci, president of the de Beaumont Foundation, which supports health initiatives. “We don’t have the tools to adequately conduct the surveillance that we need to track this virus. Instead, health departments still receive many reports by fax, or even by mail. 
Governing

The Los Angeles Times on Tuesday sued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, seeking the release of records detailing allegations of widespread sexual abuse and harassment at immigration detention centers. The lawsuit filed in federal court in Los Angeles followed a recent Times investigation that uncovered hundreds of allegations by detainees in California of violence and abuse. Few of the allegations resulted in criminal charges, a lack of accountability that fostered unchecked violence within the facilities. The Times was also among several outlets that reported on the alleged forced sterilization of over a dozen women at a detention center in Georgia.
Los Angeles Times

A potential danger for drivers is being ignored by the federal government, and it may be putting everyone on the road at risk. An exclusive Spotlight on America investigation reveals tens of thousands of cars in the federal fleet across the country are under active safety recalls, but there’s been no action to fix them despite federal workers getting behind the wheel. Now, Spotlight on America’s discovery is forcing new action in Congress. Through a Freedom of Information Act request made to the GSA, Spotlight on America obtained the Vehicle Identification Numbers, or VINs, for 207,000 cars in the federal fleet. Then, we ran them through the Vehicle Recall Search Service, a tool developed by Carfax and the Alliance for Automotive Innovation. Using that tool, we discovered more than 25,000 cars being used by the federal government have unfixed open recalls, many that date back years. Additionally, we found some cars racking up as many as five defects that haven’t been repaired by the government.
WJLA

 

Currently, Virginia is one of only five states in the nation that does not place any limit on campaign donations. As a result, “big money” dominates Virginia politics. In 2019, according to the nonpartisan Virginia Public Access Project, three-quarters of the money spent in Virginia campaigns came from donations of $10,000 or more. For years, members of the ruling establishment have defended this system, because they believe they benefit from it. Every year, a bill to limit donations (and I’ve filed many of them) is defeated on the grounds that Virginia has “the best system” because donations have to publicly be disclosed — as if the average voter feverishly is reviewing campaign disclosure forms. State politics should be about what’s best for Virginia — not George Soros or the Koch brothers. Limiting donations to $20,000 per campaign cycle is not a violation of the First Amendment. The federal courts repeatedly have upheld the constitutionality of such limits.
Sen. Chap Petersen, Richmond Times-Dispatch

By allowing an early look at proposed legislation, pre-filing permits lawmakers — and the public — to begin researching and thinking about the issues thus raised. Lawmakers then can hit the ground running in January. Conversely, waiting until January to see proposed legislation would crunch research, debate, revisions, and votes into a condensed time frame — especially if the session were held to just 30 days. Adoption of new laws does not benefit from this kind of rush. We agree that lawmakers need an early warning as to how many bills they may submit, so they can set legislative priorities and plan according to a schedule. But a unilateral order from the speaker, if it goes against precedent, is not a politically just and equitable decision — however practically expedient it might seem to be.
The Daily Progress