Transparency News 1/8/15

Thursday, January 8, 2015  

State and Local Stories

The Hopewell City Council has selected two of its female councilors to serve in the city's top leadership positions for the next two years. Brenda Pelham of Ward 6 was appointed as mayor and Christina Luman-Bailey of Ward 1 was chosen as vice mayor. The two women will serve through Dec. 31, 2016. "First I’d like to thank God for this opportunity," Pelham said. "I do believe in open government and I would like to extend to all the citizens to meet with me. … The city has made great strides in what we’ve done in the past ten years that I’ve been on council." Pelham currently has a $2.35 million lawsuit against her for a Facebook post in which she wrote that former sheriff candidate Catherine Mitchell was "part of the Klan." Pelham said the intent of her social media post was mistaken.
Progress-Index

Betty “BJ” Ostergren, 65, a longtime community activist in Hanover County, died Tuesday.Ostergren, of Mechanicsville, was vocal on government matters, and she received national media attention for her fight for Internet privacy. She was known by some as the “Virginia Watchdog” and founded The Virginia Watchdog website, where she advocated for more privacy online and retaliated against government officials by posting public records that included personal information about them.
Times-Dispatch

In a new legal filing in the defamation case against him, City Auditor/Inspector General Umesh Dalal has questioned the accuracy of a report by Richmond Commonwealth’s Attorney Michael N. Herring, who found no criminal wrongdoing last year after his investigation into in an improper attempt to increase the retirement pension of former city official Sharon Judkins. In response to the $10.7 million suit Judkins filed against him last July, Dalal’s attorneys say the auditor did not make false or defamatory statements about the Judkins matter, which Dalal investigated and reported on last May prior to Herring’s review. The defense motion, filed Tuesday in Richmond Circuit Court, says Judkins was a public official and that all the information contained in the contested report “was and is a matter of public concern.”
Times-Dispatch

A judge is scheduled to hear arguments about whether to allow still and video cameras inside the courtroom for the upcoming attempted murder trial of Jesse Matthew in Fairfax County. Matthew is also charged in Charlottesville with the abduction of University of Virginia student Hannah Graham, whose remains were found last year after an extensive search. In Fairfax, Matthew is charged in connection to a 2005 sexual assault. The Hannah Graham case has attracted significant media attention. A coalition of media organizations, including The Associated Press, has asked to place a still camera and video camera in the courtroom for the Fairfax trial and pretrial hearings. Both prosecutors and the defense oppose the request for cameras. A Fairfax County judge will hear arguments on the issue Thursday afternoon.
Virginian-Pilot

Norfolk schools Superintendent Samuel King requested a closed meeting with the School Board 5:30 p.m. Monday, according to the board’s clerk. The board was to discuss a “personnel matter” in the special meeting at the former Lafayette-Winona Middle School, 1701 Alsace Ave., according to the clerk’s email. The board already planned to hold a public hearing there at 7 p.m. for renaming of the school. The School Board's attorney, Jack Cloud, said in an email that the board will meet to discuss and consider the assignment, reassignment and alteration in the duties of specific personnel. Earlier in the day, Chairman Kirk Houston declined to elaborate on the matter, who or what staff position it involved, saying it’s confidential in nature. Houston said he has previously consulted with the board’s attorney on such matters and “I’m confident we’re on the right side of the law.”  
Virginian-Pilot

During the height of Tuesday’s snowstorm drama, an image began to spread on Facebook of the Prince William County public schools website with a banner notice containing lots of vulgarity, and a misspelled word. Here’s what it said: (And feel free skip over the next paragraph if you’re sensitive to profanity and racial epithets.) “On Tuesday, January 6th all Prince William County Public Schools will be realsing students early due to inclement weather. We have realized we are bitch niggas and apologize for the fuckery.” The website Gawker.com did a story on the supposed hack of the website, claiming they’d received the screen grab from a tipster. InsideNoVa.com also received several emails of the image, but we were unable to confirm that the notice ever actually appeared on the school website. School officials say that’s because it likely never did. “There was no hack,” Prince William schools spokesman Phil Kavits said Wednesday.  He said school officials went back through its content management system and confirmed that the home page was modified Tuesday only by “a handful of known and trusted users.”
Inside NOVA

National Stories

Congressional lawmakers on Wednesday ramped up efforts to get President Obama to release 28 top-secret pages from a 9/11 report that allegedly detail Saudi Arabia's involvement in the terror attacks.  Lawmakers and advocacy groups have pushed for the declassification for years. The effort already had bipartisan House support but now has the backing of retired Florida Democratic Sen. Bob Graham, a former Senate Intelligence Committee chairman whom supporters hope will help garner enough congressional backing to pressure Obama into releasing the confidential information. 
Fox News

Frederick County Council member Kirby Delauter (R) apologized Wednesday for threatening to sue the local newspaper if it used his name without permission, an ultimatum that earned him a two-day skewering in the blogosphere as a national laughingstock. In an afternoon statement to the Frederick News-Post, Delauter said he’d acted abruptly and out of frustration. “I thought I had long ago learned the lesson of waiting 24 hours before I hit the ‘send’ key, but apparently I didn’t learn that lesson as well as I should have,” he said. Delauter said that because he is an elected official, the paper had the right to use his name “in any article related to the running of the county — that comes with the job. So yes, my statement to the Frederick News-Post regarding the use of my name was wrong and inappropriate. I’m not afraid to admit when I’m wrong.”
Washington Post
 

Editorials/Columns

Sometimes proposals come before the General Assembly because of stories in the media. Those stories are often reported from a sensational perspective, ignoring some of the issues involved. Two examples are ethics reform and childcare regulation. Both of these have been lead stories on the nightly news and the front pages of daily newspapers. The reality is that government cannot change ethics by legislation. An individual either has ethics or does not. Therefore, the issue is really focused on the “appearance of ethics” rather than ethics. While this may have some value in representative government, it will not control those who have come to government service to enrich themselves. In addition, the proposed bills that are being introduced are geared to the relationship between public officials and registered lobbyists. Lobbyists cannot afford to risk their reputation by doing anything illegal. If appearance is the important thing, maybe limits are in order; however, if one cannot be trusted, the real question is should they be elected by their constituents?
Sen. Frank Ruff, Star-Tribune