Transparency News 12/5/16
Monday, December 5, 2016
State and Local Stories
TODAY is the last day to register for VCOG’s annual conference on Dec. 8. More than 80 people have already signed up to attend. We’d love to see YOU there.
The FOIA Council holds its final meeting of the year today at 1:30. The agenda is light and consists primarily of discussion and approval of amendments offered at the Nov. 21 meeting to the omnibus FOIA revision bill that is the product of the council’s three-year study.
Agenda and source materials can be found here on the FOIA Council's website
More than 5,000 “personally identifiable” records of Virginia veterans were included in boxes of paperwork discovered Sept. 29 in a storage unit leased by a fired Virginia Department of Veterans Services employee. The records included nearly 700 benefit claims that went unfiled, were filed late or were missing key documents. After an exhaustive, seven-week examination of 20 to 30 boxes discovered in the former employee’s storage unit in Dinwiddie County, Veterans Service officials are now working to repair the damage that affected hundreds of veterans who filed claims.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Members of the incoming Richmond City Council expressed broad agreement last week that new anti-corruption policies should be put in place following the conclusion of a 10-month investigation into Mayor Dwight C. Jones, but mayor-elect Levar Stoney is mum.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Salary isn’t everything, especially for presidents of Virginia colleges and universities whose compensation largely comes from sources other than state taxes or student tuition. Virginia Commonwealth University President Michael Rao moved into the top spot in the annual salary database for state employees published by the Richmond Times-Dispatch, based on sources of other compensation that haven’t been counted in past salary surveys. The leaders of five other Virginia higher education institutions — Christopher Newport University, the University of Virginia, Virginia Tech, George Mason University and Virginia Military Institute — also were among the top 10 earners on the list. The salary database represents a snapshot of state employee compensation as of April 1, 2016. The 2015-2016 state fiscal year ended June 30.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Chesapeake Public Schools are warning employees about a possible data breach after an employee’s laptop was stolen. Kellie Goral with CPS says that the laptop was password protected and there is currently no information that data breach has affected anyone. The personal information on the files included names, social security numbers, and bank account numbers of some present and past employees. CPS has notified over 10,000 people that could be affected and have setup a free protective service.
WAVY-10
Dozens of protestors gathered on the courthouse green in Accomac, Virginia, Friday evening to rally against the Accomack County School Board's decision to pull two classics of American literature from school library shelves. Charles Knitter of Keller, who took a lead role in organizing the rally, told the 50 or so in attendance, including dozens of high school students, that the school district has "a leadership problem."
DelmarvaNow
Williamsburg-James City County School Board Chairman Jim Kelly has asked board member Sandra Young to step down, two weeks after her husband was arrested and charged with federal child pornography charges. Investigators found more than 22,000 images of child pornography on 40 electronic devices confiscated in August from the James City County home she shares with her husband, Charles Young, 69, according to records from the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia and Williamsburg-James City County General District Court. In a search on the couple's home on Aug. 18, police searched for any "electronic data processing and storage devices" and seized 40 such items including three tablets, four laptop computers, 25 electronic storage devices and one Samsung cell phone, according to county court records. School Board clerk Janet Cerza said board members are given an iPhone and a laptop from the division. Because board members tend to work remotely, Cerza said the county will also pay for their internet service at home; it's a perk Sandra Young has taken advantage of since she took office in January. Cerza said she did not know what model computer Sandra Young was issued or whether it was among the items seized by police. Court documents also do not specify the ownership of the seized electronics.
Virginia Gazette
National Stories
Media executives are fond of making big speeches about the importance of press freedom. But which organizations are actually spending time and money on it? A new, searchable list from The FOIA project, a initiative from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University, provides a partial answer. Earlier this week, TRAC published The News Media List, a sortable readout of the news organizations and journalists that have filed lawsuits under the Freedom of Information Act. To compile the list, staffers at The FOIA Project spent a year combing through its database of nearly 9,000 plaintiff names for cases filed in federal courts since 2001. They flagged cases with media plaintiffs to come up with an initial list that includes 369 individual journalists and news organizations.
Poynter
We started FOIA Machine hoping it could help people create, track and share open records requests. We wanted to hold government accountable and make it more transparent. By working together all users benefit. FOIA Machine and MuckRock will share the same codebase, as MuckRock goes open source. As improvements are made to one tool they will more easily be developed for the other. The two sites will also share a rich database of agencies, jurisdictions, and exemptions.
Kickstarter
Editorials/Columns
Petersburg City Council has been warned that its actions this year violate the spirit of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act. We strongly agree with that assessment and urge the City Council to end its practice of holding emergency meetings with little public notice and sometimes in places that are not conducive to public participation. In a letter dated Nov. 2, Claire Guthrie Gastañaga, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia, wrote that “Certain recent actions and conduct of the Petersburg City Council . . . . appear to be inconsistent with the spirit of the [Virginia Freedom of Information] Act, and, ultimately damaging to the residents’ confidence in their local government.” We understand that City Council has been dealing with a severe financial crisis that threatens the solvency of city finances — but that is still not a valid excuse for not exercising open government. We would argue that it’s during such a crisis that City Council should be as transparent as possible to let citizens know what is happening during a crisis impacting all citizens.
Progress-Index
As the three-year examination of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act winds to a close, the body charged with reviewing that legislation is today scheduled to vote on its reforms. If approved by the Freedom of Information Advisory Council, as expected, the reforms will be considered by the General Assembly in the 2017 session. The proposals are modest and cosmetic. Some of the language is clarified and tidied up, modernized to reflect the technology now used by public officials and citizens alike. However, the reforms that won approval under the review process fall far short of the type of structural overhaul the law needs to serve the interests of a modern commonwealth. Most of the membership, save a few dissenting voices, were content to leave more than 170 exemptions intact. It is a shame that a process that began with such hope and promise devolved into little more than a rubber stamp for a flawed and inadequate law. It was also fairly predictable, owing to the design of the body ordered up by the legislature.
Virginian-Pilot
The FOIA Council holds its final meeting of the year today at 1:30. The agenda is light and consists primarily of discussion and approval of amendments offered at the Nov. 21 meeting to the omnibus FOIA revision bill that is the product of the council’s three-year study.
Agenda and source materials can be found here on the FOIA Council's website
More than 5,000 “personally identifiable” records of Virginia veterans were included in boxes of paperwork discovered Sept. 29 in a storage unit leased by a fired Virginia Department of Veterans Services employee. The records included nearly 700 benefit claims that went unfiled, were filed late or were missing key documents. After an exhaustive, seven-week examination of 20 to 30 boxes discovered in the former employee’s storage unit in Dinwiddie County, Veterans Service officials are now working to repair the damage that affected hundreds of veterans who filed claims.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Members of the incoming Richmond City Council expressed broad agreement last week that new anti-corruption policies should be put in place following the conclusion of a 10-month investigation into Mayor Dwight C. Jones, but mayor-elect Levar Stoney is mum.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Salary isn’t everything, especially for presidents of Virginia colleges and universities whose compensation largely comes from sources other than state taxes or student tuition. Virginia Commonwealth University President Michael Rao moved into the top spot in the annual salary database for state employees published by the Richmond Times-Dispatch, based on sources of other compensation that haven’t been counted in past salary surveys. The leaders of five other Virginia higher education institutions — Christopher Newport University, the University of Virginia, Virginia Tech, George Mason University and Virginia Military Institute — also were among the top 10 earners on the list. The salary database represents a snapshot of state employee compensation as of April 1, 2016. The 2015-2016 state fiscal year ended June 30.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Chesapeake Public Schools are warning employees about a possible data breach after an employee’s laptop was stolen. Kellie Goral with CPS says that the laptop was password protected and there is currently no information that data breach has affected anyone. The personal information on the files included names, social security numbers, and bank account numbers of some present and past employees. CPS has notified over 10,000 people that could be affected and have setup a free protective service.
WAVY-10
Dozens of protestors gathered on the courthouse green in Accomac, Virginia, Friday evening to rally against the Accomack County School Board's decision to pull two classics of American literature from school library shelves. Charles Knitter of Keller, who took a lead role in organizing the rally, told the 50 or so in attendance, including dozens of high school students, that the school district has "a leadership problem."
DelmarvaNow
Williamsburg-James City County School Board Chairman Jim Kelly has asked board member Sandra Young to step down, two weeks after her husband was arrested and charged with federal child pornography charges. Investigators found more than 22,000 images of child pornography on 40 electronic devices confiscated in August from the James City County home she shares with her husband, Charles Young, 69, according to records from the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia and Williamsburg-James City County General District Court. In a search on the couple's home on Aug. 18, police searched for any "electronic data processing and storage devices" and seized 40 such items including three tablets, four laptop computers, 25 electronic storage devices and one Samsung cell phone, according to county court records. School Board clerk Janet Cerza said board members are given an iPhone and a laptop from the division. Because board members tend to work remotely, Cerza said the county will also pay for their internet service at home; it's a perk Sandra Young has taken advantage of since she took office in January. Cerza said she did not know what model computer Sandra Young was issued or whether it was among the items seized by police. Court documents also do not specify the ownership of the seized electronics.
Virginia Gazette
National Stories
Media executives are fond of making big speeches about the importance of press freedom. But which organizations are actually spending time and money on it? A new, searchable list from The FOIA project, a initiative from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University, provides a partial answer. Earlier this week, TRAC published The News Media List, a sortable readout of the news organizations and journalists that have filed lawsuits under the Freedom of Information Act. To compile the list, staffers at The FOIA Project spent a year combing through its database of nearly 9,000 plaintiff names for cases filed in federal courts since 2001. They flagged cases with media plaintiffs to come up with an initial list that includes 369 individual journalists and news organizations.
Poynter
We started FOIA Machine hoping it could help people create, track and share open records requests. We wanted to hold government accountable and make it more transparent. By working together all users benefit. FOIA Machine and MuckRock will share the same codebase, as MuckRock goes open source. As improvements are made to one tool they will more easily be developed for the other. The two sites will also share a rich database of agencies, jurisdictions, and exemptions.
Kickstarter
Editorials/Columns
Petersburg City Council has been warned that its actions this year violate the spirit of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act. We strongly agree with that assessment and urge the City Council to end its practice of holding emergency meetings with little public notice and sometimes in places that are not conducive to public participation. In a letter dated Nov. 2, Claire Guthrie Gastañaga, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia, wrote that “Certain recent actions and conduct of the Petersburg City Council . . . . appear to be inconsistent with the spirit of the [Virginia Freedom of Information] Act, and, ultimately damaging to the residents’ confidence in their local government.” We understand that City Council has been dealing with a severe financial crisis that threatens the solvency of city finances — but that is still not a valid excuse for not exercising open government. We would argue that it’s during such a crisis that City Council should be as transparent as possible to let citizens know what is happening during a crisis impacting all citizens.
Progress-Index
As the three-year examination of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act winds to a close, the body charged with reviewing that legislation is today scheduled to vote on its reforms. If approved by the Freedom of Information Advisory Council, as expected, the reforms will be considered by the General Assembly in the 2017 session. The proposals are modest and cosmetic. Some of the language is clarified and tidied up, modernized to reflect the technology now used by public officials and citizens alike. However, the reforms that won approval under the review process fall far short of the type of structural overhaul the law needs to serve the interests of a modern commonwealth. Most of the membership, save a few dissenting voices, were content to leave more than 170 exemptions intact. It is a shame that a process that began with such hope and promise devolved into little more than a rubber stamp for a flawed and inadequate law. It was also fairly predictable, owing to the design of the body ordered up by the legislature.
Virginian-Pilot
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