Transparency News 11/20/14
State and Local Stories
You'll find it listed on the meeting agenda of many governing bodies in Hampton Roads — the "consent agenda." Routine by most standards, the consent agenda is a block of resolutions passed in unison by elected leaders with a single "aye" vote. It saves city councils and county boards a lot of time. Oftentimes Boy Scouts are honored, meeting minutes approved, grants accepted — it's supposed to be a collection of resolutions that require no discussion, that could cause no controversy. But sometimes items show up on local consent agendas that call out for more discussion. A Daily Press review of city council and county board consent agendas going back to July 1 found that million-dollar budget transfers, agreements for sole-source contracts and agreements that sidestep traditional purchasing policies were all items approved during these block votes by Peninsula-area localities.
Daily Press
Two early permit applications filed by the contractors who won Richmond’s Stone Brewing projectwere an attempt by the contractors to lower public costs by taking advantage of free dirtfrom a different construction site, according to the office of Mayor Dwight C. Jones. Grant Neely, the mayor’s chief of staff, said in an email Tuesday night that the land-disturbance applications filed Oct. 9 were the result of a private initiative by Hourigan Construction and the Timmons Group, the team that eventually won the $18 million Stone contract from the Richmond Economic Development Authority on Oct. 22. “This permit was filed privately — not at the request of the EDA, the city or any public official,” Neely said. “I assume this was to secure a competitive advantage.”
Times-Dispatch
In 14 years in the House of Delegates, a square-jawed, red-headed lawyer from Danville named Whitt Clement became one of the General Assembly Democrats who quietly made things happen — filling the key posts at the head of the Appropriations Committee panels that dealt with the big bucks: highways and other major construction work for the state. In 2002, Clement moved from being in the second rank of General Assembly leaders to the top of the heap of the state's giant roads-ports-airports-and-rail bureaucracy, taking on the six-figure job of secretary of transportation. When his term was up — after enough time to lock in a pension pegged to that six-figure salary — Clement found work back at a law firm. But it was a much bigger one that the little Danville firm he ran in his legislative days. Clement hooked up with Hunton and Williams, the Richmond-based giant with 800 lawyers in 19 offices ranging from London to Los Angeles, Beijing to Brussels and Tokyo to Texas. He's the head of the firm's state government relations unit — "lobbying," in plain English — a group that's reckoned among the most effective in Capitol Square.
Daily Press
Virginia Beach Mayor Will Sessoms has hired a team of criminal defense attorneys, and a special prosecutor from Lynchburg was named Wednesday to investigate whether Sessoms' votes might have broken state conflict-of-interest laws. Norfolk attorney Lyn Swartz said Wednesday he and his son, Jeff Swartz, are representing Sessoms and will be joined by former Virginia Beach councilman Billy Harrison of the Williams Mullen law firm. Swartz said the team is in the early stages of its investigation and would not comment on conflict-of-interest questions raised in a Pilot article earlier this month. Lynchburg Commonwealth's Attorney Michael R. Doucette on Wednesday accepted the appointment as special prosecutor, a week after Virginia Beach Commonwealth's Attorney Colin Stolle said he had his own conflict of interest and couldn't be involved.
Virginian-Pilot
Pittsylvania County Community Action may have to repay almost $34,000 to the county for insufficient documentation for services it provided for the West Piedmont Workforce Investment Board. The Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors is considering a three-year payment plan under which the county would subtract $1,000 a month from funding it normally provides for PCCA. Lisa Fultz, executive director of the West Piedmont Workforce Investment Board, said the PCCA provided insufficient documentation for youth services it provided under contract with the workforce investment board between July 1, 2011, and June 30, 2012, and between July 1, 2012, and June 30, 2013.
Register & Bee
National Stories
The Illinois House has voted to override Gov. Pat Quinn's veto of legislation that allows governments to charge higher fees for large public records requests. Legislators voted 77-36 on Wednesday to override the veto. It now goes to the Illinois Senate, where it will require a three-fifths vote to override. The Legislature approved the measure during the spring session. Quinn vetoed it, saying it would reduce transparency. Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie, D-Chicago, is the bill's sponsor. She said it gives municipalities a way to address sometimes "spiteful, harassing" Freedom of Information Act requests.Northwest Herald
The United States Postal Service granted almost all of the nearly 6,700 requests from law enforcement agencies last year to monitor the mail of Americans for use in criminal and national security investigations, Postal Service officials told a House panel on Wednesday. The officials said that only 10 requests had been denied, for a rate of approval that some members of Congress sharply criticized. Cases of monitoring are called mail covers because the collected information comes from the outside of letters and parcels. “The fact that 99.85 percent of the mail covers were approved raises serious questions about privacy and the management of the mail covers program,” said Representative Blake Farenthold, the Texas Republican who is chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee responsible for the Postal Service, the panel that heard the testimony.
New York Times
Newly released emails, sent to and from Missouri's top public-safety officials, show that the state police captain placed in charge of security in Ferguson after Michael Brown's death was both vilified and praised for attempting to replace authorities' militarized approach with one more sympathetic to protesters. The emails, obtained by The Associated Press through an open-records request, also show that police tried to find a way to protect members of the clergy who were in the protest crowds, and that some officers objected to an order to take their meal breaks in public.
Fox News
Editorials/Columns
Times-Dispatch
