Transparency News 11/30/15

State and Local Stories

State law might say some government records must be disclosed, but that's not the way many Virginia officials see things. A statewide test by 13 newspapers to see what happens when Virginians ask about information that state law says officials must disclose shows the state's four-decade-old Freedom of Information Act is widely disregarded. More than half of the more than three dozen police or sheriff's departments included in the test refused to release any information about felony incidents, even though the act says those are "records required to be released." About one-quarter of local government and school board offices refused to release information about the salaries and allowances of city managers, county administrators and high school principals — in Radford, school officials took five days and charged $12 to look up and provide the salary of the city's one high school principal. "This is what we've been hearing anecdotally, an uneven and inadequate response, not just here and there … it's a systematic problem," said Del. James M. LeMunyon, R-Fairfax, chairman of the state Freedom of Information Advisory Council.
Daily Press

It's not quite as tough to get public records on the Peninsula as it is elsewhere in the state, but it still isn't as easy as Virginia's Freedom of Information Act suggests it should be.
Daily Press

When reporters and editors from The Winchester Star fanned out to local governments, school boards and law enforcement agencies this month to see if they would comply with the state Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), most passed the test. A few of the journalists, however, were asked who they were by Frederick County and Clarke County Public Schools employees. FOIA does not require that a person asking for information explain why they want it, nor does the requester have to provide their name or employer. An editor seeking the Clarke County High School principal’s salary was told to fill out a form, which specifically asks if the person making the request is a member of the press.
Winchester Star

When asked to produce public records that, by law, are open for inspection by the public, government offices in Williamsburg and James City County had mixed results.
Virginia Gazette

Most municipalities — with a few exceptions — canvassed in the Lynchburg area adhered to the letter of the state’s open-records laws by providing requested documents either immediately or within the legal window of five business days.
News & Advance

A test of state open-record laws in the Richmond area yielded mixed results, with some local government officials providing information the day it was requested and others refusing to release it at all. Richmond officials provided some information but refused to provide a copy of the chief administrative officer’s contract, even as the official acknowledged it likely was a public document.
Richmond Times-Dispatch

While some local-government officials around Virginia may have been less than forthcoming with the disclosure of public records during a statewide test earlier this month, that reaction wasn’t the case for the most part among Charlottesville-area agencies. Though a number of officials in Central Virginia were apprehensive of requests for information such as criminal incident reports, high school principal salaries and financial documents, they were ultimately helpful in providing the documents.
Daily Progress

Local government in the hometown of founding father James Madison responded expeditiously, and in most cases cordially, to recent requests for information. At 9:05 a.m. on Nov. 5, the Star-Exponent visited the Orange County School Administration Office and asked receptionist Elaine Brown for the salary amount and allowances for the principal of Orange County High School. Brown asked the reporter who she worked for and her name. When asked by the reporter, “Does that matter?” Brown responded in the affirmative, saying all visitors needed to sign in and wear a visitors badge to even be present in the school administration building. The reporter was told to have a seat.
Star-Exponent

In two instances, Northern Virginia Daily staff member Tina Comer was told to provide her requests in writing. The Shenandoah County School Board office and the Warren County administration required Comer to complete a FOIA request form that she then submitted. FOIA does not require that any particular form be used to make a request, or even that a request be made in writing, Alan Gernhardt, staff attorney for the FOIA Advisory Council, said Wednesday. A public body may provide a form for convenience but it cannot require a requester to use it, Gernhardt explained. At no time did anyone ask Comer why she wanted the information or for whom she worked, her reports state.
Northern Virginia Daily

Two men on a three-person procurement team helped choose their former employer for a state vending machine contract late last year. The offer was rescinded after a competitor — and the current vending contract holder — complained. It was re-awarded earlier this year, this time by a new procurement team, but again to Canteen, a major player in the vending game.
Daily Press

How much is a local elected official worth? That’s not a provocative invitation to anti-government commenters. It’s a serious inquiry that governments periodically must consider, even as candidates, knowing full well how much the job pays, line up to run for election. Pay for the all-consuming jobs on local city councils and county boards ranges from $190,000 for the full-time City Council chairman in Washington D.C. to $27,500 for the part-time member of Alexandria’s City Council. That disparity led Alexandria council member Paul Smedberg last week to propose a pay raise for the council and mayor, and the council’s part-time aides. The city manager was asked to return Dec. 8 with a recommendation, which the public will have a chance to comment on Dec. 12, before the council votes. Any raise would not take effect in January, when the newly elected council and mayor start their new three-year term.
Washington Post

National Stories
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Public records requests have surged in recent years, thanks in large part to the transparency and open data movements. The U.S. Public Interest Research Group, which has been evaluating transparency in state spending for six years, reported that 2015 saw dramatic improvements in how and how much information was provided online. The same goes for cities, where the number of open data sets accessible to the public has climbed since the Open Knowledge Foundation began tracking them in 2013. But not everyone is riding the transparency wave, especially when it comes to the handling of public records requests. Take Massachusetts. In many ways, the state is a leader in transparency and open data efforts, but when it comes to its public records law, it’s another story. A small but growing number of cities and counties are going even further and starting to share the responses to requests for public records by posting them online. The first to do this was Montgomery County, Md., which passed legislation in 2012 mandating the publishing of public records requests. The county’s website lists the person or organization who made the request, the date of the request, a description of the document and a link to the information.
Governing

A Baltimore judge’s order granting anonymity to the jurors who will decide whether a city police officer bears responsibility in the death of Freddie Gray Jr. marks the latest in what legal observers say is a growing phenomenon: Those who dole out justice in the country’s most sensitive cases sometimes do so without having to reveal their identities to the public. Citing extensive publicity and asserting that those deciding the guilt or innocence of Officer William G. Porter could face “harassment,” Judge Barry G. Williams ordered Tuesday that the jurors’ names not be made public. Defense attorneys had requested the atypical move and asked that jurors be told specifically that they would be granted anonymity.
Washington Post

Everybody knows times have been tough for local journalism, and there’s been plenty of attention anytime a mainstream daily newspaper has shut down (the Rocky Mountain News, The Cincinnati Post), ceased daily printing (New Orleans’ Times-Picayune, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer) or scaled back staff (basically everyone). These events have tremendous implications for how government is covered. Often it means readers get less information about far-off places, whether they be foreign cities or state capitals. But there’s a particular void that’s left when alt-weeklies go away. One of their staple coverage areas, along with art and music coverage, is an intense focus on city government and local leaders. It’s rare to find another home for 5,000-word stories on how business owners impact neighborhood zoning decisions, how bureaucrats dole out favors using tax increment finance districts or why city council members are squabbling with one another. “When you have less competition, it becomes easier for people in city hall,” says Dan Kennedy, a journalism professor at Northeastern University and a former media critic for the now defunct Boston Phoenix. “Anytime you don’t have to worry about a reporter from one news organization trying to beat the competition at your expense, that [means] less scrutiny.”
Governing


Editorials/Columns

Open government. Transparency. Government of the people, by the people, for the people. Fundamental principles that undergird our democratic republic, but sometimes the officials in charge of the day-to-day operations of government need to be reminded just who, ultimately, is in charge: the people. The results of this one-day test of the system should be troubling to all Virginians, not just the news media which serves as the public’s government watchdog. And the problem of non-compliance encountered by newspaper reporters across the state? It’s simply a problem of “education,” say government officials. Megan Rhyne, the executive director of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government, disagrees. “Sometimes, the problem is in the people not being properly familiar with the law,” she said. “Other times, the problem is a view of FOIA as a nuisance or an afterthought, something that gets in the way of the real work of government.” That is a cultural change that must take place at the root level of government. The results of this spot check of government across the commonwealth indicate there’s a lot of work to do.
News & Advance

What's amazing to us is that this happens year after year. The Associated Press used to conduct similar FOIA audits for years and recorded a similar pattern of failure. One might think that the notoriety or embarrassment might serve to motivate officials, but that doesn't seem to be the case. While we can accept that many of these missteps are a result of misunderstanding the law, we also know that some officials do not feel it is their duty to honor the public's request. They need the stick instead of the carrot. That's why we believe Virginia should join 24 other states by making purposeful violations of FOIA a class 1 misdemeanor, punishable with a fine and/or jail time. The absence of such consequences means we will continue to see a reluctance to do better with compliance.
Daily Press

When its proposed national drone registry comes online, the Federal Aviation Administration will be poised to collect the names and street addresses of recreational drone users across the country. Who will be able to access that data after it is collected? If the FAA’s drone task force has its way, the answer will be not journalists. In an article Monday, I praised the task force’s recent report on what the impending drone registry should look like and urged the FAA to pay it heed. I’d like to temper my initial enthusiasm just a bit. On Twitter today, journalist Alex Howard pointed out a section of the report that I somehow overlooked during my first read. In it, citing individual privacy concerns, the panel recommended that the FAA issue “an advance statement that the information collected will be considered to be exempt from disclosure under FOIA.” (FOIA is the Freedom of Information Act.)
Justin Peters, Slate