Transparency News 1/19/15
State and Local Stories
There's not much muscle in Virginia law when officials violate the public's right to know what their government does -- but Del. Rick L. Morris, R-Carrollton, would like to fix that. He's introduced a bill that says public officials who willfully violate the state Freedom of Information Act's provisions on access to public records or the rules on open meetings could go to jail.
Daily Press
They got nothing like four-figure jaunts at plush golf courses or $15,000 checks to cover wedding expenses, but some local officials, too, get gifts — and this year they are reporting on them as well as making other more detailed disclosures about their private interests. Politicians seem to be paying closer attention to financial disclosure forms after former Gov. Bob McDonnell landed himself in scandal — and was sentenced to two years in federal prison — for accepting gifts and loans from a Virginia businessman, many of which he never reported. Those disclosures, as well as regular reports on how politicians finance their campaigns, are the heart of Virginia's approach to ensuring clean, honest government. Many of this year's financial disclosures by local elected officials include detail they hadn't reported in the past. Daily Press reviews of local officials and state legislators' filings last year found several instances of careless or incomplete reporting. Even when complete, Virginia's requirements are vaguer than many other states, so it is hard to get a sense of where officials might stumble into conflicts of interest.
Daily Press
Two members of the Virginia General Assembly have introduced bills that would change the mandate that official government notices be advertised in local newspapers. The measures have the backing of the Virginia Municipal League, but have drawn opposition from statewide press and open government groups. Supporters say the legislation will save money and allow localities to tailor their official communication strategy to the community. “Young people clearly are not reading the newspaper, but they do look at their cellphones all the time,” said Mark Flynn, general counsel to the Virginia Municipal League, who added that he’s not impugning the important role that newspapers play in informing the public. “Using that vehicle — electronic communication — would contact a lot higher percentage of the population, particularly as you get into the younger age bracket,” Flynn said. For a mid-size locality, Flynn said, the cost of placing notices could be at tens of thousands of dollars, “and the question is, ‘Is it a good use of money?’” Megan Rhyne, of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government, acknowledges the changes would save money but says that shouldn’t be the only consideration. “The government could cut anything and everything and that would save money, but no one would argue, say, that we should stop doing fire inspections because that would save money,” Rhyne said in an email. “Proposals to save money by cutting a certain program or service have to be weighed against sound policy arguments to justify the cuts.”
Daily Progress
The University of Virginia will pay more than $500,000 for separate reviews of its response to a since-discredited fraternity gang rape claim and the school’s sexual assault policies, but many lingering questions could go publicly unanswered. Recently signed contracts obtained by The Daily Progress show that an international law firm will be paid $500,000 to probe the university’s handling of “the specific allegations in Rolling Stone,” while, separately, Philadelphia attorneys will assess school policies and procedures. The contract for the latter work includes a clause stipulating that the attorneys “maintain all communications as confidential.” A university official did not respond to questions about what might be made public from the second evaluation, which, according to the contract, does not contain a cap for fees or expenses.
Daily Progress
The King George County School Board’s new chairman, John Davis, asked board members to considerhaving its meetings at schools around the county as a way of encouraging the community to become more involved. Board member Kristin Tolliver asked about the logistics of having meetings in other locations, such as the availability of microphones and recording the meetings for television.
Free Lance-Star
A new service lets people in Strasburg use smartphones or the Internet to report problems such as potholes or broken street lights. Strasburg rolled out YourGov, a free service, on Friday. Public Works Director and acting Town Manager Jay McKinley described YourGov as an application that allows people to report non-emergency problems and service requests. A user can submit a report on a pothole, vandalism, street-light outage or other problem via the smartphone application or using the YourGov website. The person reporting the problem can take a photograph with a smartphone and send the image with the request along with location and details. YourGov automatically delivers reported problems to the Department of Public Works for their review and then routing to the appropriate agency for handling. Reporting a problem through YourGov reduces the risk that the request gets lost, McKinley said.
Northern Virginia Daily
A land-rights coalition wants to curb the power of Virginia’s public utilities and open company records to the Freedom of Information Act. At the urging of the Augusta County Alliance, Sens. Emmett Hanger, R-Mount Solon, and Creigh Deeds, D-Bath, seek to repeal a 2004 state law that allows utilities to go onto private lands to conduct surveys without permission of property owners. The issue is a volatile one, as Dominion Energy plans to run a large-gauge natural-gas pipeline across Virginia — much of it on private land. In a related move, Delegate Scott Surovell, D-Mount Vernon, wants to include “comments” on proposals filed with the State Corporations Commission, which oversees utilities. His bill is HB 2013. Megan Rhyne said her Virginia Coalition for Open Government “generally supports efforts to include SCC under the auspices of the Freedom of Information Act. We think all state agencies should be under FOIA instead of governed by a separate statute, as is the case with the SCC right now.”
Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau
Islamic State sympathizers appear to have hacked another government website, this time the website for a Virginia county. Officials in Isle of Wight — population 35,000 — say the county’s website was hacked Friday night by a group calling itself Team System DZ, a local NBC affiliate reported. The message “I love ISIS” was posted at the top of the website and pro-Islamic State messages and a video of profanity took up the rest of the web page, the station reported. “They’ve hacked into some of the best computers in the world,” the county’s information resource manager, Don Robertson, told the station. “So … while we are certainly disappointed, we are going to take every step that we can to clean it up and make sure the public is not impacted by it.” He added that the website, which he said is run by a third party, has been targeted by hackers in the past.
Washington Times
National Stories
Public records will become cheaper and easier to access under changes to Michigan's Freedom of Information Act. Government agencies will not be allowed to charge more than 10 cents per page for copies of public records; they can face increased fines for delaying responses, and people seeking the records now can sue if they consider the fees to be exorbitant. Dirk Milliman of the Michigan Press Association said the changes have been years in the making and involved compromise, but, overall, the new law increases transparency and access to public records.Detroit Free Press
Editorials/Columns
Megan Rhyne, Free Lance-Star
The University of Virginia’s staid and belated response to last fall’s gang-rape allegations incensed countless members of the community. Now we know more about the drama occurring behind the curtain while UVa officials were standing silently on the public stage. New information shows that some leaders were more concerned about image and reputation than about truth or empathy. The revelations come from more than 1,500 pages of emails — obtained by The Daily Progress through the Freedom of Information Act — from members of the Board of Visitors and others following a magazine story alleging a gang rape at a UVa fraternity. We do know that there was an immediate dispute within the Board of Visitors over how to respond — swiftly and with candor, or slowly and with concealment. “We need to avoid emails,” wrote George Keith Martin on Nov. 19, knowing that emails would be subject to the open-records law. “Will call you tomorrow.” “I really don’t care who sees this email,” Edward Miller said, urging an emergency meeting of the board. “Screw the reputation of the university if … we have a culture that is not in keeping with our principles [and needs to be dealt with].”
Daily Progress
Clearly, the Daily Press does not agree with state law on freedom of information requests. The paper believes there should be no charge for any request. I would agree if there were no public costs, but that is far from reality. When the Daily Press goes on a fishing expedition, as they readily admit they did with this request, there is a public cost. City staff is taken off its important public responsibilities to engage in this fishing expedition for the paper.
Jim Bourey, Daily Press
We are not in the habit of writing rebuttals to opinion columns criticizing us, as a matter of balance. But we make exceptions when someone misrepresents the facts, as Mr. Bourey has done in his characterization of our actions and our intent regarding this particular request. On one point we do agree with Mr. Bourey: We challenge many facets of Virginia's open records act. But that is because our lawmakers seeded the law with hundreds of loopholes for officials to hide behind. One loophole is the lack of limits on what public bodies are allowed to charge to fulfill FOIA requests, the area in which we crossed swords with Mr. Bourey. This provision is ripe for abuse, since a high cost effectively dissuades the average citizen from seeking public documents. This is a tactic commonly employed across the state, and one we've run into plenty of times before in other jurisdictions.
Daily Press
In December, Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s bipartisan Commission on Integrity and Public Confidence in State Government submitted an initial set of recommendations for reform of Virginia’s ethics laws. Two recommendations topped the list of suggested reforms: placing a monetary cap on the value of gifts of all kinds from any source to public officials and the creation of an Independent Ethics Review Commission with the power to conduct investigations and enforce the ethics laws. There appears to be strong momentum for adopting a reasonable cap on both tangible and intangible gifts, such as meals and travel. While positive, stronger gift restrictions alone are not enough. Our second recommendation is as important as the first. In fact, all of our ethics recommendations are premised on the existence of an independent entity with investigative and enforcement powers.
Rick Boucher and Bill Bolling, Roanoke Times
