Transparency News 12/13/17

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

Big changes are coming. Watch this space....

State and Local Stories

The Front Royal Town Council’s attorney defended the council’s decision Monday to talk about a salary study behind closed doors. The council convened in closed session prior to its regular meeting to discuss several items, including a town employee compensation study underway by Paypoint HR. The council voted on the motion to go into the closed session “with respect to discussion and potential implementation of the results of a preliminary draft of a town employee compensation study prepared exclusively for viewing by and discussion with the Town Council and certain town staff in closed meeting with respect to specific town employees.” The council entered into a contract with Paypoint to study salaries and positions in the town government offices. The Virginia Freedom of Information Act does not exempt salary data exceeding $10,000 a year from public view. But Town Attorney Doug Napier told media representatives at the meeting that the study could contain information such as recommendations to eliminate certain positions that, if made public, might cause chaos or prompt resignations. Before the council resumed its closed session, Napier said that members had not yet seen the draft.
The Northern Virginia Daily

Prince William County School Board Chairman Ryan Sawyers is going to court again, filing defamation lawsuits against a pair of men who accused him of sexual misconduct in public settings. Sawyers is seeking $1.35 million in damages in each case, both of which he filed in Prince William County Circuit Court on Dec. 6, alleging that the men knowingly made false statements in public to attack his character.  One suit targets William Petrak, a Woodbridge man who has worked since last year to collect signatures to recall Sawyers from office. Sawyers claims that Petrak acted with a “reckless disregard” for the truth when he accused the chairman of being a “sexual predator/harasser” in a Dec. 2 Facebook post.  The other lawsuit references an unidentified man, dubbed “John Doe,” as a defendant, following some comments made during “citizen’s time” at the school board’s Nov. 29 meeting.
InsideNoVa

Lynchburg City Council members voted down a proposal to boost their own salaries at their Tuesday night meeting. In a 5-2 vote, with only council members Jeff Helgeson and Sterling Wilder voting yes, the council declined a motion put forward by Wilder to increase council’s annual salaries from $12,000 for the mayor and $10,000 for council members to $18,000 for the mayor and $15,000 for council members. Helgeson came out in strong support of raising the salaries at the beginning of the discussion because of the time commitment required of council members to serve on a variety of commissions and boards and appear at public events. He also was in support of the raise for council members because Lynchburg City Council’s salaries are the lowest of any city with more than 75,000 residents in Virginia.
The News & Advance

Waynesboro City Council is expected to approve a hefty $4,000 raise for each of its five members next month. But it's not exactly the sweetheart deal it seems at first blush. Taxpayers will actually save money under the deal, because in return for the annual raise, council members would no longer be covered by the city's health insurance policy. The policy annually costs the city a minimum of $6,700 per person.  The change, which must be approved by council in the form of an ordinance, would take effect on July 1 of next year. It would increase the salary of the mayor from $6,120 to $10,020 per year, and the pay of the four other council members from $5,100 to $9,100  per year.
The News Virginian

An Ohio-based developer wants to put 59 rent-controlled apartments in an empty downtown Portsmouth lot, but it’ll have to convince skeptical City Council members who would rather lure a grocer there. Woda Group has submitted a plan to the city for a 76,000-square-foot, four-story building at 818 County Street, just south of Effingham and High streets. Woda hopes to rent out about 5,000 square feet of retail space on the first floor. But a majority of City Council members seem unconvinced by the idea – which was raised last month by the Portsmouth Redevelopment and Housing Authority board – and they will ultimately decide whether to give Woda the OK to build. Some housing authority board members said they’re frustrated that the land has been vacant for decades, and Alisa Winston, the authority’s deputy executive director, told the City Council that the the authority had signed a letter of intent with Woda. The authority refused to release the letter this week, citing an exemption to the state’s Freedom of Information Act that allows government officials to withhold information “relating to the negotiation and award of a specific contract where competition or bargaining is involved and where the release of such information would adversely affect the bargaining position or negotiating strategy of the public body.”
The Virginian-Pilot


National Stories
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Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley says text messages are public records under Missouri’s open records law, raising fresh concern about fellow Republican Gov. Eric Greitens’ use of a secretive app that deletes text messages after they’ve been read. Hawley said his office policy – and legal view — was that text messages sent or received by state employees about state business should be subject to the same rules as emails when it comes to public records under the state’s Sunshine Law. That doesn’t necessarily mean all text messages would be made available upon request, just as all emails are not. “There is a process for determining what is a record. What’s a closed record? What’s an open record? Our view is that text messages are emails in that respect and should be subject to the same analysis,” Hawley said. His comments came as Greitens called reports about the use of the app Confide within his office “fake news.”
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Two people posing as Associated Press reporters telephoned the office of a Democratic congresswoman Tuesday and spewed racial slurs, the lawmaker said. Lauren Easton, the AP's director of media relations, said the news agency "decries any attempt to impersonate an AP journalist. AP staffers identify themselves when making calls and treat sources and interview subjects with professionalism and respect."
The Virginian-Pilot

Senior F.B.I. officials who helped investigate Donald J. Trump’s presidential campaign last year wrote in text messages that Hillary Clinton “just has to win” and described a potential Trump victory as “terrifying,” according to texts released Tuesday night. A top counterintelligence agent, Peter Strzok, exchanged the messages with Lisa Page, a senior F.B.I. lawyer. Some messages criticized Mrs. Clinton’s team, the Obama administration, Congress and other Democrats. But the two appeared appalled at some of Mr. Trump’s comments during the campaign and feared that he would politicize the F.B.I. For example, after Mr. Trump made an apparent sexual allusion related to the size of his hands, Ms. Page wrote: “This man cannot be president.” In another exchange, Mr. Strzok wrote of a potential Trump presidency, “I’m scared for our organization.” He also referred to Mr. Trump as a “douche.” The messages were turned over to Congress and obtained by The New York Times.
The New York Times