Transparency News, 2/25/2022
Friday
February 25, 2022
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state & local news stories
How Northumberland’s school board handled last month’s meeting covering mask requirements was still on the mind of two parents at this month’s board of supervisor’s meeting where they aired their concerns. The school board chose to address a student disciplinary matter and a personnel matter in closed session before having the masking discussion, and kept parents waiting for one hour and 45 minutes for the public portion of the meeting to begin. Aggravating matters, the meeting was advertised as open to the public. But the parents who came were required to watch the meeting on a television in the foyer. Only those who signed up to make a public comment got to see the school board in person. And then, they were called into the room one at a time, the parent explained.
Northern Neck News
stories of national interest
The New York Civil Liberties Union is appealing a lower court’s ruling that the Rochester Police Department doesn’t have to release all of its officer disciplinary records. The organization filed its appeal Tuesday with the state’s Appellate Division, according to a news release. The NYCLU previously submitted a broad request for all of the department’s disciplinary records and unsuccessfully sued it and city government to get the files, which they claimed the entities failed to produce. A law signed by former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in June 2020 repealed section 50-a of Civil Service law. The statutes had long shielded police disciplinary records from the public, and the intent of the law was to make the records subject to state Freedom of Information Law requests. But departments across the state have been selective with what they’ve released. For example, an online database of disciplinary records released by the city in January 2021 only includes records where misconduct allegations against officers were sustained.
WXXI
