Officials are citizens, too

Tom Jackman article in today's Washington Post covers the simmering controversy over the flash-in-the-pan logo for Prince William County.

Here's the breakdown:

1. County staff unveils new county logo.
2. Logo is said to have cost $750.
3. Board of Supervisors hates it. Not just hates it, loathes it.
4. Supervisors tell staff to throw the logo out.
5. Suprvisor Pete Candland hears through the grapevine that the logo may have cost thousands of dollars, not hundreds.
6. Candland asks for more information and is rebuffed. "This is overkill," the board chair tells Candland in a memo.
7. Candland files FOIA request for records on the logo's cost and development. Chair calls it "over the top and ill-natured."
8. County staff tells Candland that there may be a cost for providing those records.
9. Candland's wife sends out an outraged email to constituents ("This is wrong. Really wrong," she says) asking them to contribute to Candland (not to pay for the FOIA request, just to support Candland).
10. Snarky columns follow.

To the board chair: An elected official has as much right to file a FOIA request for records as an individual citizen. Like them, he has no durty to justify is request. If he wants the records, and they're not exempt, he should be able to have the records without accusations that it's overkill, over the top and ill-natured, which ultimately implicate his motives for wanting the records. Motives are irrelevant to FOIA.

To Candland's wife: An elected official has as much right to file a FOIA request for records as an individual citizen. Like them, he can be charged for the actual cost of providing the records for them, and he is not entitled to receive preferential treatment on fees because of his position. Even if those records show waste and abuse, he can be charged for staff time and copies, though for an easy, routine request, the fees should probably be waived.

It is what it is: a request for records. And everyone should treat it as such.