Transparency News, 3/2/20

Monday
March 2, 2020

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state & local news stories

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After a series of lawsuits made it to Virginia’s highest court, lawmakers are trying to increase transparency regarding donations to publicly-funded state universities. Although state universities are public, they also operate private foundations which allow for anonymous, untracked donations.  Critics say that's a problem, because that private money may influence major decisions made by public institutions. “So while they are private foundations, they do exist solely to support our public institutions,” said Stacie Gordon, with the advocacy group Partners for College Affordability and Public Trust. “So I think it's important that lawmakers understand what this money is going towards.”
VPM

If you have thoughts about the cost of tuition at Virginia Tech, get prepared. Members of the public must sign up a week in advance if they want to secure a speaking slot before the university’s board of visitors this month. “The seven day sign up is an unnecessary barrier that Virginia Tech has erected in their public comment process,” James Toscano, president of Partners for College Affordability and Public Trust, a nonpartisan advocacy group, said. “If a member of the public wants to make remarks at the typical city council meeting, they don’t have to preregister seven days in advance in order to do so.” “Long story short, I just don’t see the need for so much time,” to preregister in advance, Megan Rhyne, executive director of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government said in an email.
The Roanoke Times

A key witness in the federal fraud trial against Newport News’ former airport executive director said that her boss — Newport News’ then-city manager, Jim Bourey, — didn’t want her to tell others in 2014 about a taxpayer-backed loan to a private airline. Florence Kingston, Newport News’ top economic development official, testified Thursday that she knew why the Newport News/Williamsburg International Airport was asking for a $700,000 grant from a regional air service group in the summer of 2014. “I knew that the city manager did not feel it necessary to share that,” Kingston testified. A few months later, when news reporters began asking about People Express after it collapsed, Bourey sought assurances that Kingston had not told them about the loan guarantee. “So she did not ask about the loan info and, of course, you did not volunteer it," Bourey wrote in an email, referring to a Daily Press reporter. “Heck no and no,” Kingston wrote back. 
Daily Press

Virginia Commonwealth University police are investigating allegations that members of the Student Government Association removed stacks of The Commonwealth Times, the student newspaper, in an apparent response to an article on the front page about conflict within the student-led organization. Commonwealth Times news editor Hannah Eason reported Wednesday that she, along with multiple other anonymous witnesses, saw Student Government Association members taking newspapers out of kiosks around campus and that copies of the paper were seen in trash cans and recycling bins. The incident — which inspired a group of student senators to make plans to impeach the current student president — came after the newspaper published an article reporting that some members of the Student Government Association accused leaders in the organization of harassment and creating a toxic environment. Since the news of the stolen newspapers was published, the student newspaper staff has seen students speaking up about issues surrounding the student government.
Richmond Times-Dispatch

Ron Scearce was the newest member of the Pittsylvania County Department of Social Services board when he strolled through the office handing out business cards in August 2017. Soon after, he started receiving anonymous phone calls from unhappy department employees. What followed over the course of the next 18 months would roil a divided Pittsylvania community. The ongoing debate about the work environment at the county’s social services department led to the firing of its director, Sherry Flanagan, who has filed a defamation and wrongful termination lawsuit against the county and Scearce. Four employees filed their own lawsuit three months later, claiming a hostile workplace and an unfair grievance procedure that ultimately led to what they described as forced resignations. The turmoil also resulted in investigations into allegations of a toxic work environment at the department, first by the local social services board and later by state commissioner Duke Storen, that did not support that conclusion. Eventually, Scearce was temporarily suspended from the local board by the state board of social services, an unprecedented step by state officials denounced by the Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors chairman, who charged overreach by the state board into local affairs. At its heart, the events in Pittsylvania County centered on questions of oversight for local departments of social services. The conflicting roles of the state board, the social services commissioner, local board members, members of the board of supervisors and the local director came under scrutiny.
The Roanoke Times

stories of national interest

John Kuglin, a former Associated Press bureau chief for Montana and Wyoming who was a champion for open government and the public's right to know, has died, his son said Saturday. He was 78. Tom Kuglin, a reporter and assistant editor for Helena's Independent Record, said his father died overnight at home in Helena after a prolonged illness. John Kuglin oversaw coverage of some of the biggest stories to come out of Montana, such as the arrest of Unabomber Ted Kaczynski in 1996 and the FBI standoff with the anti-government Freemen that same year. One of Kuglin's enduring legacies is the Montana Freedom of Information Hotline, which he started in 1988 as a way to give journalists and citizens free legal advice on public records and open government meetings. Today, Mike Meloy, the attorney retained by the hotline, receives more than 100 open-government queries a year.
Missoulian

Vanessa Bryant is “absolutely devastated” by allegations that Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies shared photos of the helicopter crash that killed her husband, daughter and seven others, her attorney said in a statement. The Los Angeles Times first reported allegations that deputies were sharing graphic photographs of the scene. After The Times’ report Thursday, an investigation was launched by the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department. According to two public safety sources with knowledge of the events, an individual reported one deputy for showing grim images at a Norwalk bar. Normally, such a complaint would trigger a formal inquiry and possibly an internal affairs investigation, strictly following the chain of command, the sources said. Instead, the Sheriff’s Department quietly ordered deputies to delete any photos in an attempt to keep the matter under wraps. In the days after the crash, deputies were ordered to report to the department’s Lost Hills station and told that if they came clean and deleted the photos, they would not face any discipline, said the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the events.
Los Angeles Times
 

"Instead, the Sheriff’s Department quietly ordered deputies to delete any photos in an attempt to keep the matter under wraps."

editorials & columns

Imagine if Richmond’s mayor decided that he didn’t like a story and attempted to kill the message by confiscating the newspapers. If that disturbs you, you understand why what happened at Virginia Commonwealth University matters a lot. The Feb. 26 edition of The Commonwealth Times was removed from at least six on-campus kiosks by what witnesses and the newspaper say were leaders of the school’ s Student Government Association. The lead story in that edition, with the headline “Toxic,” described infighting within the SGA. If the mass removal of newspapers has the fingerprints of SGA leadership on it, it only reinforces the toxicity cited in the initial piece. But the crime in question is distressingly commonplace; accountability, no guarantee. Last fall at Radford University, the theft of 1,000 copies of The Tartan by a university employee went unpunished, according to the Student Press Law Center and The Roanoke Times. I covered a similar story in 2003 at Hampton University, where school officials — unhappy with a front-page story during homecoming week on health code violations in the university cafeteria — rolled hand trucks in and confiscated bundles of the issue.
Michael Paul Williams, Richmond Times-Dispatch

"But the crime in question is distressingly commonplace; accountability, no guarantee."