Transparency News 11/13/15

State and Local Stories

The Virginia Coalition for Open Government presented one of its three open government awards to Daily Press reporter Dave Ress today for his continuing effort to press for public access to a database of thousands of state court case records. Also receiving an open government award was Ben Schoenfeld, a civic hacker, for helping the newspaper review some of the records by writing a computer program to "scrape" some of the case data from the OES website. The third award recipient was Jack Kennedy, the clerk of circuit court for Wise County and the City of Norton. Kennedy not only provided access to the requested information, but also urged the state's other court clerks to do likewise.
Daily Press

In Virginia, unlike Washington, there is nothing wrong with using private email to transact the public business of government. But that doesn’t mean the correspondence is protected from the public records laws, a panel of experts said Thursday during the annual conference of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government, held at the University of Mary Washington. “Email is a record,” said Alan Gerhardt, staff attorney for the Virginia Freedom of Information Advisory Council, adding that the same requirements apply to text messages and other forms of correspondence. It doesn’t matter where the record is created. Rather, said Gerhardt, the central question is, “Is it in the transaction of public business?”
Richmond Times-Dispatch

Martinsville City Council is changing how it hears public comments at its regular meetings. The move largely stems from many people not wanting to be on television when they speak, as well as comments heard during past meetings that did not pertain to city business, Mayor Danny Turner said Thursday. Starting at the Nov. 24 meeting, Turner said, “business from the floor” – the time when people in the audience can come to the podium to briefly speak about city issues not scheduled for discussion during a particular meeting – will be the last item on the agenda for meetings. That part of the meetings will not be televised, and people will be able to speak from their seats, although they still will have to identify themselves, he said. People wanting to discuss an issue at length will be required to contact the city manager’s office or a council member prior to a meeting so their presentations will become part of the meeting’s formal agenda, Turner said. Their presentations will be televised, but efforts will be made to schedule them early during meetings, he said. Anyone who wants to discuss an issue at length but does not want to be on television will be able to speak to council members before a meeting starts. Turner said plans are to make two council members available at the municipal building before the start of each regular meeting to participate in such discussions.
Martinsville Bulletin

National Stories
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A federal judge issued an order Thursday that will sharply ramp up the volume of documents being released in a lawsuit demanding memos and emails from top aides to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. U.S. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras instructed the State Department to move toward production of 2,200 pages of documents per month in the case by next summer, up from a rate of 700 pages per month he set at a hearing earlier this week. The schedule virtually guarantees that a significant volume of records about Clinton, who is the leading Democratic candidate for president, will be emerging through the primary and caucus season and into the heart of the general election next fall.
Politico

The UNC system’s Board of Governors will meet Friday to hear a report on faculty compensation and take action on a legislative request – two weeks after giving controversial raises to chancellors in a lengthy closed session. The notice for Friday’s previously unplanned meeting was sent to reporters Wednesday. An agenda listed the two topics – faculty compensation and a legislative request – but gave no further detail. UNC system officials did not respond to a request for more information Wednesday. Shelly Carver, a spokeswoman in the office of state Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger, said in an email Wednesday that legislators’ request to the board was “related to concerns about compliance with the state’s open meeting laws.”
News & Observer

Florida’s expansive open records laws have IT leaders preparing a new push to open up the state’s data. Jason Allison, the state’s chief information officer, said staff at his Agency for State Technology are taking steps to start the “inventory process” of cataloging all of Florida’s data, as they attempt to meet the standard laid out by the law that “all information is public information.” “We’re working real diligently to understand what we have, what the authoritative source of that information is, and make it available to the public,” Allison told StateScoop at the National Association of State Chief Information Officers’ annual conference in October. “We’re working with the agencies to start to build out that framework.”
State Scoop

Editorials/Columns

Do you want the good news first or the bad news? OK, the good news is that in a ranking of state government ethics, Virginia came in at No. 16 (after being ranked 47th in the previous rankings, done in 2012). Nice improvement, right? But the bad news is that in the letter grades accompanying the ranking, our commonwealth got a "D," and that doesn't stand for dandy.
Daily Press

[Roses go to] The City of Hampton, which placed among the top 10 mid-sized cities in America in a survey by the Center for Digital Government to determine the localities that make the best use of technology. The center in particular noted Hampton's mobile app for reporting property damage after storms.
Daily Press