COLONIAL BEACH – FOIA’s “working papers” exemption got invoked to keep citizens in the dark about three developers’ proposals for 1.5 acres of municipally owned boardwalk property. With one dissenting vote, the council authorized the mayor/acting town manager to negotiate the sale with one of the developers. When asked for copies of the three developers’ proposals, the mayor claimed the documents were working papers of the town and would not, accordingly, be made available for the public to review. If other council members were shown the proposals, they were not a chief executive’s working papers.
CULPEPER COUNTY – Three Culpeper County supervisors had an impromptu meeting with residents after the county sent out notices that no meetings would be held. The three met with two dozen members of a grass-roots group organized to push for a second county high school. The group had planned to protest the board’s lack of action during a scheduled public forum. When the board’s evening session was canceled, so was the forum. The group then planned a protest outside the County Administration Building. “We decided to do the right thing and let them come inside,” county administrator Frank Bossio said, noting it was cold that night. A second county high school and its possible tax-rate implication were discussed. Bossio said the meeting was not illegal because it was not instigated by supervisors. “The citizens called that meeting,” he said. The Culpeper Citizen called it “another – although perhaps well-intentioned – violation of state law.” The board already was facing a Freedom of Information lawsuit over a previous meeting, dealing with the same topic, that was closed to the public. (See related story, page 1.)
FAIRFAX COUNTY – A neighborhood task force got off to a bad start with its density housing study when the moderator ruled that a private citizen (whose wife was serving on the advisory group) couldn’t use a personal video camera to tape the proceedings. The county attorney had noted that the group did not need to record its proceedings; somehow, that got mistranslated to mean citizens could not make recordings, either. As members later discovered, FOIA makes clear that any citizen can record a public meeting.
FAUQUIER COUNTY – When staff members and a county’s entire Board of Zoning Appeals use a van to visit various sites, does it result in an illegal meeting? County Attorney Kevin Burke insisted that “as long as we’re not discussing business, that is not transacting.” The Times-Democrat argued that the van’s departure location and time should have been advertised, as well as the van’s expected arrival time and exact location of at each site, and that the van itself should have been open for public boarding and riding. An editorial said, “it seems obvious that any assemblage of an entire county board and staff – confined in a vehicle and riding around to different sites – is bound to discuss what they have gone to see. And these conversations are likely to play a part in the way the vote will go later.” There was “no room in the van,” the BZA chairman said. But, as the editorial noted, county staff could have followed elected officials in a separate vehicle. If no business were to be “transacted” on the road, why would the staff have to be there, it asked. “Other county officials, including members of the Board of Supervisors, seem to understand and appreciate FOIA rules, and will go out of their way to avoid even the appearance of an illegal meeting – even if it means traveling in separate vehicles, or avoiding expressing an opinion about an issue until it comes up in the proper forum.”
HAMPTON ROADS – When a member of the public asks for information about salaries at Virginia International Terminals, officials deny the request, saying VIT is a private company and not subject to the state’s open-records law. But when it comes to paying taxes, the organization says it’s exempt, based on an IRS provision for entities that provide an essential governmental function. But there’s no doubt about the disclosure responsibilities of the Virginia Port Authority. It was created by the state a quarter-century ago to oversee marine terminals acquired from Norfolk, Newport News and Portsmouth. It appoints the VIT board, approves the VIT budget and depends on VIT for part of its revenue. The authority’s budget comes roughly half from VIT earnings and half from the Transportation Trust Fund, the state’s gas-tax repository. The state supposedly protects its interest through a board of commissioners, appointed by the governor and approved by the Authority. However, the Daily Press reported the authority’s 12-member board of commissioners did not know how much VIT executives were paid, and hadn’t followed the state’s open-meetings laws. Three of its members privately set Executive Director J. Robert “Bobby” Bray’s compensation during telephone calls. The committee had neither voted on Bray’s salary in public nor submitted it to the full board for approval. Officials promised to clean up their act.
HENRY COUNTY – The School Board voted 4-3 to propose that it be paid the same as members of the Board of Supervisors. That would constitute a 337.5 percent raise for school board members. The vote came after a closed session on a “personnel matter.” No area residents or reporters were present for the public vote. Before the closed session, every board member had said he or she did not anticipate doing any other business in open session later. Contacted after the meeting adjourned, the school’s superintendent failed to mention that any vote had taken place. The action was disclosed a day later. A motion to convene a closed meeting must identify the subject and purpose of the meeting, and not just cite a statutory exemption.
MIDDLETOWN – Town Council found itself behind closed doors for almost two hours to discuss “legal matters” – but no one would elaborate. Council members were joined not only by Town Attorney Stephen Butler, but also by developer David Holliday; two Frederick County supervisors; the county planner; two representatives of a Winchester engineering/planning firm; and Del. Clifford L. “Clay” Athey, R-Front Royal (the legislature already had convened for its winter session).
NORTHAMPTON – Richard Tankard, a member of the Accomack-Northampton Transportation District Commission, complained he was being denied revenue and expenditure figures for the Eastern Shore Railroad, but was told those were confidential documents only available to members of the railroad’s board. Said Tankard, “It’s kind of hard to provide oversight when you are denied access.” He noted that he was not asking for any information relative to personnel, rates or contracts, but simply the financial reports that would indicate if the rail line is operating at a loss or not.
PARIS, FRANCE (!) – Members of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel Commission went overseas on a supposed fact-finding trip, with profits from bridge-tunnel tolls covering a $900 dinner tab for nine at the glittering Lido de Paris cabaret on the Champs-Elysees. Champagne came with the package. So did the topless dancing girls. Add in airfare, $316-a-night hotel rooms in the four-star Le Meridien Montparnasse, an $800-per-person registration fee, and the six-day conference attended by the nine cost $19,648.80. The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel is home to the highest bridge tolls in the country, the Newport News Daily Press noted.
RICHMOND – A state Education Department bureaucrat sought to muzzle officials at the Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind to keep them from talking with anybody outside the department about a planned consolidation of the Hampton and Staunton campuses. The attempted gag, obtained under FOIA, was e-mailed May 2 and written by assistant state school superintendent Doug Cox. “The DOE obviously has an agenda. They don’t want anyone talking about this project because they’ve already made their minds up. The way they’re handling this is utterly ridiculous. It’s not open government,” Del. Chris Saxman, R-Staunton, complained. “Among others, elected leaders, parents and students and private citizens who might have ideas to share on the consolidation issue are effectively being shut out,” the Augusta Free Press observed.
RICHMOND – The Virginia Board of Medicine’s disciplinary system and its Internet disclosure rules continue to come under fire. The Daily Press editorial staff recently noted that all information (except licensing and disciplinary information) is self-reported. “The system is so geared to protecting the livelihoods and reputations of physicians that the interests of patients sometimes get left in the waiting room,” the paper said. The board has a Web site on which the public can look up doctors. That’s a good idea, but it needs to provide early disclosure of credible complaints, be easy for users to navigate, and use language easy for ordinary people to understand.
ROANOKE COUNTY – The Virginia Recreational Facilities Authority, which runs Explore Park, negotiated secretly for a year with an accountant and nursing home magnate, then won quick approval for a proposed 50-year contract (with almost no strings attached) to let him develop and administer the 1,100-acre site. Legislators and some local officials knew about the talks, but nobody else did. Six state legislators were added to the authority’s board July 1. The Roanoke Times had argued editorially, to little avail, for “fullest possible” public hearings on the fate of the Blue Ridge Parkway/Roanoke River facility. A “white knight” was needed, officials insisted – and they could not be choosy. The county had threatened to cut off its $700,000 public subsidy in 2006 and the state had abandoned support earlier.
STAUNTON – Officials negotiated a confidential deal with the former acting fire chief. He had filed a lawsuit alleging he was passed up for a promotion to chief because he is black. City Manager Bob Stripling and the attorney for the former firefighter said only that a “satisfactory resolution” had been reached. According to Maria Everett of the Virginia FOI Advisory Council, this type of financial information becomes open to the public as soon as both parties reach an agreement.
WESTMORELAND COUNTY – The school board apparently was violating – regularly and routinely – provisions of FOIA designed to give citizens “ready access to public records” and “free entry to meetings of public bodies.” School Superintendent Elaine Fogliani said the school board abides by FOIA guidelines issued by its attorney and the Virginia School Board Association. “We do it the same way every other school board in Virginia does it,” she insisted. But minutes of 22 board meetings held since January 2004 show that the body failed to specify its reasons for closed-door meetings, incorrectly cited some sections of FOIA as reasons for closed meetings and has apparently discussed matters in closed session that the law does not permit.
WILLIAMSBURG – A College of William and Mary maintenance worker was fired and another was disciplined after violating a supervisor’s orders not to talk with the press. However, outgoing president Tim Sullivan quickly reinstated them, acknowledging a mistake had been made. A union spokesman noted, “they were exercising their constitutional rights.” A reporter had interviewed them about the suicides of two students at a W&M dormitory.