Transparency News 12/8/16
Thursday, December 8, 2016
State and Local Stories
A company seeking to build an arena near the Oceanfront is challenging the City Council vote that halted the project. United States Management has asked the city attorney to review whether nine votes were required to approve the transfer of city land for the project and is arguing that a supermajority vote was not required. The City Attorney’s Office has said a supermajority vote was required to approve the deal because the arena would be built on 5.8 acres of city land. The land would be leased to the company for 60 years. USM hired legal firm McGuire Woods in Richmond to conduct research on how to interpret the law. McGuire Woods issued a 35-page opinion that said a supermajority vote was not required.
Virginian-Pilot
The self-described “best friend” of Norfolk Treasurer Anthony Burfoot testified Wednesday that he would not trust what the city’s former vice mayor says under oath. “This is really hard for me, but no,” said Keith McNair, a former bail bondsman whom Burfoot hired in late 2013 to work in the Treasurer’s Office. “My opinion is, I question his truthfulness.”
Virginian-Pilot
A federal judge has agreed to temporarily suspend the enforcement of a jury’s verdictin the multimillion dollar defamation lawsuit that was found in favor of a University of Virginia administrator. In a motion filed Monday, attorneys for the magazine asked Judge Glen Conrad to override the jurors’ verdict, challenging the finding that Erdely had acted with actual malice in scribing misleading statements about Eramo. On Tuesday, Conrad granted the motion to hold off on enforcing the verdict until the motion to overturn the verdict has been settled, writing that the magazine had shown “good cause” to do so. Eramo’s attorneys have not responded .
Roanoke Times
A federal appeals court appeared skeptical Wednesday of a constitutional challenge that seeks to allow candidates for local office in Virginia to be identified by political party on official ballots. The three-judge panel likely won’t rule until early next year, but the case could have significant ramifications for how democracy works at the ground level in Virginia. The challenge centers on the question of whether the state has a rational basis for requiring nonpartisan ballots for local races but identifying candidates for federal, statewide and General Assembly offices as Republican, Democrat or any other political party.
Daily Progress
A Virginia school district voted Tuesday to return “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” back to school library shelves after they were briefly suspended following a parent’s complaint.
Washington Times
National Stories
The Department of Veterans Affairs has for years assigned star ratings for each of its medical centers based on the quality of care and service they provide, but the agency has repeatedly refused to make them public, saying they are meant for internal use only. USA TODAY has obtained internal documents detailing the ratings, and they show the lowest-performing medical centers are clustered in Texas and Tennessee. VA hospitals in Dallas, El Paso, Nashville, Memphis and Murfreesboro all received one star out of five for performance as of June 30, the most recent ratings period available.
News Leader
A fired District city employee has filed a $10 million whistleblower lawsuit alleging he was terminated because he would not steer contracts to one of Mayor Muriel E. Bowser’s largest campaign contributors. The suit filed Monday in D.C. Superior Court by Yinka T. Alao is the latest accusation that a recent shakeup at the Department of General Services was political retaliation by the mayor’s office.
Washington Post
The Wyoming Supreme Court has ruled against the Wyoming Tribune Eagle in a public records dispute with Laramie County School District 1. In a 3-2 decision issued Wednesday, the state’s highest court ruled that government agencies are allowed to charge people to look at electronic public records. The fee should be a reasonable charge for the cost of producing a copy of the record, the majority of the justices said.
Wyoming Tribune Eagle
Editorials/Columns
After three years, a state advisory council has come up with four tweaks to the state’s Freedom of Information Act. One of them: Virginia no longer can withhold the names of people who subscribe to the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries’ magazine, Virginia Wildlife. ’Twas a famous victory. To be fair, the other proposed changes are more substantial: One prevents local governments from withholding the times and locations of meetings that are carried over, and the other removes correspondence from the exemption for a public official’s working papers. This means a governor, lawmaker or county supervisor no longer can claim every email he or she reads or writes qualifies as an official state secret. And even if every loophole were closed, problems would remain. Chief among them: the frequent, flat-out refusal of local government agencies to provide information that the law plainly requires them to provide.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Virginian-Pilot
The self-described “best friend” of Norfolk Treasurer Anthony Burfoot testified Wednesday that he would not trust what the city’s former vice mayor says under oath. “This is really hard for me, but no,” said Keith McNair, a former bail bondsman whom Burfoot hired in late 2013 to work in the Treasurer’s Office. “My opinion is, I question his truthfulness.”
Virginian-Pilot
A federal judge has agreed to temporarily suspend the enforcement of a jury’s verdictin the multimillion dollar defamation lawsuit that was found in favor of a University of Virginia administrator. In a motion filed Monday, attorneys for the magazine asked Judge Glen Conrad to override the jurors’ verdict, challenging the finding that Erdely had acted with actual malice in scribing misleading statements about Eramo. On Tuesday, Conrad granted the motion to hold off on enforcing the verdict until the motion to overturn the verdict has been settled, writing that the magazine had shown “good cause” to do so. Eramo’s attorneys have not responded .
Roanoke Times
A federal appeals court appeared skeptical Wednesday of a constitutional challenge that seeks to allow candidates for local office in Virginia to be identified by political party on official ballots. The three-judge panel likely won’t rule until early next year, but the case could have significant ramifications for how democracy works at the ground level in Virginia. The challenge centers on the question of whether the state has a rational basis for requiring nonpartisan ballots for local races but identifying candidates for federal, statewide and General Assembly offices as Republican, Democrat or any other political party.
Daily Progress
A Virginia school district voted Tuesday to return “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” back to school library shelves after they were briefly suspended following a parent’s complaint.
Washington Times
National Stories
The Department of Veterans Affairs has for years assigned star ratings for each of its medical centers based on the quality of care and service they provide, but the agency has repeatedly refused to make them public, saying they are meant for internal use only. USA TODAY has obtained internal documents detailing the ratings, and they show the lowest-performing medical centers are clustered in Texas and Tennessee. VA hospitals in Dallas, El Paso, Nashville, Memphis and Murfreesboro all received one star out of five for performance as of June 30, the most recent ratings period available.
News Leader
A fired District city employee has filed a $10 million whistleblower lawsuit alleging he was terminated because he would not steer contracts to one of Mayor Muriel E. Bowser’s largest campaign contributors. The suit filed Monday in D.C. Superior Court by Yinka T. Alao is the latest accusation that a recent shakeup at the Department of General Services was political retaliation by the mayor’s office.
Washington Post
The Wyoming Supreme Court has ruled against the Wyoming Tribune Eagle in a public records dispute with Laramie County School District 1. In a 3-2 decision issued Wednesday, the state’s highest court ruled that government agencies are allowed to charge people to look at electronic public records. The fee should be a reasonable charge for the cost of producing a copy of the record, the majority of the justices said.
Wyoming Tribune Eagle
Editorials/Columns
After three years, a state advisory council has come up with four tweaks to the state’s Freedom of Information Act. One of them: Virginia no longer can withhold the names of people who subscribe to the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries’ magazine, Virginia Wildlife. ’Twas a famous victory. To be fair, the other proposed changes are more substantial: One prevents local governments from withholding the times and locations of meetings that are carried over, and the other removes correspondence from the exemption for a public official’s working papers. This means a governor, lawmaker or county supervisor no longer can claim every email he or she reads or writes qualifies as an official state secret. And even if every loophole were closed, problems would remain. Chief among them: the frequent, flat-out refusal of local government agencies to provide information that the law plainly requires them to provide.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
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