Transparency News 3/15/16
State and Local Stories
On remand to the Fairfax County Circuit Court, Judge Randy Bellows orders the Department of Corrections to turn over some of the requested records related to the mandufacturers’ installation instructions for use of the electric chair, but says the other records still in dispute do not have to be released.
Fairfax County Circuit Court
The Chesapeake City Council could decide Tuesday to allow a developer not to share with new residents a list of contaminants – including elevated levels of arsenic, lead and petroleum hydrocarbons – found in the area's shallow groundwater. Bainbridge Properties, Inc., owner of a three-acre residential property called Portlock Square, has asked the council to change one of its proffers – a promise to the city made when its rezoning was approved in 2005. The provision required Bainbridge to prohibit use of shallow groundwater on the site at Bainbridge Boulevard and Yager Court because of the contaminants found on the property, and notify future builders or occupants of the contaminants. The developer now requests that the proffer be modified slightly so it does not have to provide a list of those contaminants in its disclosure statements to new residents. The water's use would still be prohibited.
Virginian-Pilot
A jury trial of former Altavista Police Chief Kenneth Walsh has been scheduled for July 20 and could last several days, Bedford County Deputy Commonwealth Attorney Wes Nance said Monday. In September of 2015 Walsh was indicted on one count of embezzling public funds and nine counts of forging public documents.
News & Advance
Middletown Town Council approved on Monday an ordinance to permit councilors to vote on action items even when they are not physically present at a meeting. The ordinance allows remote participation through phone or conference calls. Previously, councilors who remotely participated in meetings were considered absent and deemed unable to cast a vote. Mayor Charles Harbaugh IV said in an interview after the meeting that in the past, most councilors were retired and usually available to attend all meetings. One of the reasons the ordinance was adopted, according to Harbaugh, was because most current councilors have full-time jobs.
Winchester Star
National Stories
West Virginia has enacted a bill that exempts all personal information of law enforcement officers, including information already exempt in Virginia like SSNs and health information, but also including their contact information, the contact information of their parents, spouses and children, and the names of the officer’s spouse, parents and children.
http://www.legis.state.wv.us/Bill_Text_HTML/2016_SESSIONS/RS/bills/HB2800%20SUB%20ENR.pdf
(scroll down to lines 73 to 78)
The Comptroller’s Offices of Research and Education Accountability (OREA) is making it easier to understand Tennessee education. OREA has just released a glossary of commonly-used education terms, with the aim of assisting legislators and Tennesseans. The glossary contains more than 180 entries and spans pre-K to higher education. Legislators and staff received printed versions of the glossary, which can also be found online at http://www.comptroller.tn.gov/OREA/.
Herald Courier
For an ongoing series on race in Colorado, Rocky Mountain PBS investigative reporter Katie Wilcox requested five years of records from six cities on when police stop people for suspicious behavior and other reasons. Grand Junction provided information from its field interviews at no charge. Pueblo billed Wilcox $20, Colorado Springs asked for $88 and Fort Collins quoted her $60. Denver doesn’t keep the data by race. Aurora’s price? $290.85. And that’s for 1,151 printed pages from a database. Not an Excel spreadsheet like Wilcox received from other cities. If she wants to inspect all 22,309 reports, she’ll have to pay the city $111,510.40 to cover the cost of copies and the redaction of any confidential information. Aurora’s response to Wilcox’s records request illustrates a common problem facing journalists and anyone else in Colorado who wishes to analyze public records kept in spreadsheets or databases. Too often, they get PDFs or stacks of paper instead. This makes analysis difficult or sometimes impossible.
Colorado FOI Coalition
When Florida’s public records law was approved 40 some years ago, people were still using typewriters and rotary dial telephones. If you wanted a public record, you got a piece of paper or maybe lots of pieces of paper. Technology has changed all of that and has presented a challenge for members of the public who want to know what their government officials are up to and local governments that want to avoid violating the law. During Sunshine Week, March 13-19, reporters from newspapers all over Florida are looking at one aspect of the technological changes: texting. Local officials send and receive texts relating to their official duties from a number of sources. Florida’s public records law is clear that the public has the right to see all documents relating to the conduct of public business unless there is a specific exception in the law. The section of the law governing how long to keep texts is less clear.
Florida Society of News Editors
The Senate backers of legislation to strengthen the government's open records laws are hoping to pass their bill on the floor in the coming week. The Judiciary Committee passed a bill to reform the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) early last year, but it has been blocked from getting unanimous approval because of a few Senate holdouts. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) told The Hill he is removing his year-long hold on the bill after Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), the lead sponsor, agreed to some changes to his bill. Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) also had a short hold on the bill but it was removed days ago.
The Hill
Editorials/Columns
I’m not criticizing the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision to protect advocacy spending as free speech. If a billionaire runs for governor, and has virtually unlimited personal resources to spend on campaign commercials, why shouldn’t groups of less wealthy people have the freedom to pool their resources in opposition? I get that. The problem right now is that the old restrictions on donor influence haven’t yet been replaced, at the federal or state level, with new rules to limit the power of the few over the many. One simple solution could help, and Sunshine Week is a good time to start the conversation: Let the voters know who is financing political campaigns by requiring full and immediate disclosure of major contributors to the campaigns, parties and groups buying political ads before an election.
George Stanley, Richmond Times-Dispatch
Some parents and activists insisted they should get to decide what all children are taught. In Virginia’s case, the law permits parents to withdraw their own children from certain lessons — without changing the curriculum for everyone else. The public schools are public. That makes their curricula a question of public policy. So citizens as well as parents have every right in the world to chime in about what they’re teaching. Moreover, that right does not pop in and out of existence depending on whether their objections are valid or foolish. Virginia’s would-be scolds, apparently, think otherwise.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
This session became the gift that keeps on giving, at least to state lawmakers. In addition to giving themselves a raise in their stipend, the General Assembly made one more little tweak to state law before leaving on Friday. They voted to allow unlimited gifts of any kind, as long as it’s under $20. And I know the argument will be that it’s only $20, so why does it matter? The answer now is the same one I voiced previously. The cost of the benefit isn’t the problem. Regardless of if it’s a $20 meal or a $200 meal, if a lobbyist or one of the state’s corporations buys something for one of our lawmakers, then there’s the implication that lawmaker could be swayed to a certain way of thinking. It’s one of the reasons that I support a complete ban on gifts. If a corporation official just happens to get tickets to a game, the retail value may be $20 or below, but it’s still a benefit. The only difference between that and what Secretary of Commerce Maurice Jones did is the fact that taxpayers ended up covering the cost of Jones’ stay in the luxury box. No one can sit there and tell me that if a corporation calls and sets up a meeting to “just have coffee” the day before a vote, they’re not looking to sway that politician in a certain direction.
Brian Carlton, News-Virginian
