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Thursday
March 29, 2018
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state & local news stories
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 "I cringe when I hear people saying things or pontificating … to make a point as opposed to … being prepared."
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Washington region residents have filed Freedom of Information Act requests to D.C., state and local governments, including Loudoun County, in hopes of discovering the breadth of incentives being offered to Amazon in hopes of landing the web and retail giant's second headquarters. The FOIA requests were submitted by members of the D.C. Metro chapter of Democratic Socialists of America in conjunction with the anti-Amazon HQ2 ObviouslyNotDC campaign. The group has now launched a partner website, NoVaSaysNo.com. “As our elected officials across the DMV rush to give away billions of taxpayer dollars to Jeff Bezos’s Amazon, they have essentially stonewalled the general public on what exactly is being offered,” Alex Howe, an Alexandria resident and organizer with D.C. DSA, said in a prepared statement. “Our public money should be used to fund affordable housing, schools for our children, and projects that benefit our entire community.” Leaked information from some finalists show governments have offered incentives worth well into the billions.
Loudoun Times-Mirror
Leesburg citizens can expect to hear less from their representatives from the dais. Council voted Tuesday night to impose time limits on council member comments, discussion and questions at future meetings. “I think we have a tendency to not be prepared,” Mayor Kelly Burk said. “I cringe when I hear people saying things or pontificating … to make a point as opposed to … being prepared and having an efficient meeting.” Council considered imposing time limits after it observed how the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors’ meetings ran more efficiently with a time limit. Leesburg’s time limits will hold council members to standards similar to citizen petitioners. Councilman Tom Dunn called for a rescission of the vote, requesting that the five-minute time limit not include staff answers since this would limit public fact finding. The motion failed 3-4.
Loudoun Times-Mirror
Abingdon town attorney Deborah Icenhour filed a motion to dismiss herself, individually and professionally, from a lawsuit that accuses Abingdon Town Council and Icenhour, as town attorney, of violating the Freedom of Information Act. The motion, filed Jan. 8 in Circuit Court, said only members of a public body can hold a meeting and violate the meeting provisions of the FOIA.
Bristol Herald Courier
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stories of national interest
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Michigan State University leaders have denied The Detroit News’ appeal to review some personnel documents of the ex-dean of the college’s medical school and former boss of disgraced sports doctor Larry Nassar. The decision came the same day authorities arrested William Strampel, the former dean at MSU’s College of Osteopathic Medicine. The newspaper sought records concerning Strampel through the Michigan Freedom of Information Act in December — the same month he took a medical leave and weeks before Nassar was sentenced for sexual assaults involving former patients. A Detroit News investigation found the dean was among at least 14 university staffers who received reports about Nassar’s misconduct in the two decades before his arrest.
Detroit News
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo helped free a newspaper reporter from police custody Wednesday after the reporter was detained for talking on his cellphone in the state Capitol. Kenneth Lovett, Albany bureau chief for the New York Daily News, was detained shortly before 1 p.m. in the lobby of the New York State Senate chamber. Witnesses and officials said Lovett was talking on his cellphone as he walked through the area — where access is generally not restricted, although a sign says cellphones “Must be turned off” in the “Senate chamber.”
Politico
An Asheville (North Carolina) advocacy group is calling on the city to improve transparency in the police department following the publication of body camera footage in February that shows a white former Asheville police officer beating a black city resident. “For our city to move forward from this tragic incident, we need to talk about solutions,” Patrick Conant, a member of Code for Asheville, told the city’s Public Safety Committee on March 26. “And I feel strongly that our city has a much stronger chance for success if they involve citizens in that process.” Code for Asheville has asked the city to post emergency call data, citation and arrest data, citizen complaints, traffic stop report data and historical crime reports from before 2013 on the city’s online open data portal. The organization has also requested that the city release the demographics of officers in the police department, as well as more information regarding use-of-force incidents — including the location of the incident, the type of force applied, the type of resistance and injuries to the subject or officer.
Mountain Xpress
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 "I feel strongly that our city has a much stronger chance for success if they involve citizens in that process."
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editorials & columns
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 "If a bill dies now, in the light of day, voters have a much better chance of knowing who wielded the ax."
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In 2017, according to the Virginia Public Access Project, bills that died did so without a recorded vote about 55 percent of the time. This session, that percentage fell to less than 30 percent. Using the raw data, the number of bills killed without a recorded vote fell from 777 last year to 429. There are still ways of killing a bill while no one’s looking, as a recent Richmond Times-Dispatch article noted. A bill can be consolidated into another bill, referred to a committee that isn’t scheduled to meet, or a committee can choose not to vote on it at all. It is obvious that there are bills brought before the legislature that some would prefer to kill without public scrutiny. But this new transparency makes lawmakers accountable. If a bill dies now, in the light of day, voters have a much better chance of knowing who wielded the ax.
The Free Lance-Star
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