Transparency News, 3/31/20

 

Buckingham County officials have distributed a release detailing how citizens can provide comments for scheduled public hearings for Buckingham County Board of Supervisors meetings during the coronavirus pandemic.  The release highlights several ways that residents can submit comments to the board, although the methods require certain restrictions. After emailing, individuals will receive a notice with a link and/or telephone number to connect virtually during the meeting.  Commenters are asked to note that a three minute time limit will apply to public comments during public hearings. Individuals should leave their name, district and what specific public hearing they are commenting on. 
Farmville Herald

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors announced that its 5 p.m. Wednesday meeting will be the first virtual one for the board. The Albemarle County School Board held a virtual meeting last week and has added to its schedule four COVID-19-related virtual meetings. UVa’s Board of Visitors discussed plans related to the university’s response to the pandemic during a 50-minute closed emergency meeting Monday. Held over conference call, the meeting did not include any public discussion or comments from board members.
The Daily Progress

Bristol has canceled all regular public meetings through late April and restricted access inside council chambers for Monday’s called meeting. Four members were present, and Councilman Kevin Mumpower called in. Council members said their intent — and the resolution’s intent — is that all regular city business be handled in a public setting in City Hall and comply with all state open-meeting requirements. County Manager Randy Eads said the public welfare is the prime concern.
Bristol Herald Courier

The dozens of people who show up at Shenandoah County’s annual public hearing on the budget must do so electronically this time. Virginia’s ban on groups of 10 or more people pushed local governments to change the way they hold public meetings and still allow the public to attend at least remotely. The state also allows public bodies to meet electronically. The Shenandoah County Board of Supervisors held its first meeting via electronic means last week in which most members participated in a live-streamed conference call. The public could watch and listen but not participate. The county did notify the public that emails could be sent to a special email address and the messages were entered as part of the record for the meeting. The county received four emails before the meeting. The county switched to www.gotomeeting.com for Thursday’s public hearing on the proposed fiscal 2021 budget and 2020 tax rates for real estate, personal property and other levies. County Administrator Evan Vass said Monday by phone that this online service allows the public to speak at the hearing. The county also accepts comments on the proposed budget and tax rates via email at comment@shenandoahcountyva.us and by mail. Vass pointed out that elected bodies for years have accepted emails and hard copies of comments from the public.
The Northern Virginia Daily

 

 

Government officials are reportedly using phone location data to track the movements of Americans during the coronavirus pandemic in an attempt to understand the spread of the virus and plan a response. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention along with state and local officials are receiving reports about the “presence and movement of people in certain areas of geographic interest” based on phone data, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal. 
c|net

The Freedom of Information Act Commission of the State of Connecticut ruled that schools cannot withhold staff misconduct reports because of FERPA in mid-February.  The University of Connecticut said this will not change their established practices, according to university spokesperson Stephanie Reitz. The complaint to the Connecticut FOIC was filed by New Haven Register reporter Christopher Peak this past November. Peak requested documents relating to an incident involving a student and faculty member at Achieve First Amistad High School in New Haven. The student was pushed into a corner by the faculty, but when Peak requested the documents, the school’s principal refused to provide them, citing FERPA.
The Daily Campus

A federal judge who questioned Attorney General William Barr’s “credibility” received an unredacted copy of special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian interference in the 2016 election. Justice Department attorneys notified the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia of the transfer in a brief filing on Monday, noting it was in pursuance to two orders this month by District Court Judge Reggie Walton. Walton, an appointee of President George W. Bush, said the court had “grave concerns about the objectivity of the process that preceded the public release of the redacted version of the Mueller Report” and its “impacts on the Justice Department’s subsequent justifications” that its redactions of the report were authorized under the Freedom of Information Act.
Washington Examiner

The Department of Defense is quietly asking Congress to rescind the requirement to produce an unclassified version of the Future Years Defense Program (FYDP) database. Preparation of the unclassified FYDP, which provides estimates of defense spending for the next five years, has been required by law since 1989 (10 USC 221) and has become an integral part of the defense budget process. But the Pentagon said that it should no longer have to offer such information in an unclassified format, according to a DoD legislative proposal for the pending FY 2021 national defense authorization act. “The Department is concerned that attempting publication of unclassified FYDP data might inadvertently reveal sensitive information,” the Pentagon said in its March 6, 2020 proposal.
Secrecy News

The Massachusetts Department of Public Health, which only releases the number of people who have contracted or died from a disease by county, has asked cities and towns to stop releasing the number of cases of the coronavirus in their communities. Since the coronavirus outbreak began in Massachusetts in early March, cities and towns across the state have decided to release the number of residents who have tested positive in their communities. Some municipalities send press releases any time they are notified of new cases, a handful of town officials are posting such numbers on their official Facebook pages and other communities are updating their websites daily to reflect the number of cases in town. Following the Department of Public Health’s recommendation on Friday, some cities and towns say they will take the advice and no longer be releasing how many residents have COVID-19 in their communities.
Governing
 

 

 

Many elected officials serving at the county and city level are senior citizens and at elevated risk of infection. One of the first public policy problems to emerge as the virus spread was how to maintain continuity of government and to continue regular meetings while protecting everyone’s health and safety. We are fortunate to live in an era of tremendous technological innovation, enabling people to bridge great distances by using online communications platforms that enable and facilitate collaboration. However, access to these platforms can be limited. They weren’t exactly designed to accommodate the sort of interaction and debate one sees at a city council meeting. There are also accessibility rules about how a representative government should operate, codified in the Virginia Freedom of Information Act which specifies rules about the conduct of open meetings. These should never be abridged out of convenience and public officials should strive to adhere to them in this crisis. It has been reassuring to see governments in Hampton Roads trying strike that balance between access and maintaining social distance, limiting the number of meetings, paring down agendas to essential business and trying to model the behavior expected of everyone in this crisis. That cannot last for the months it could take for life to begin a slow return to normalcy. And the budget process that every city and county must conduct, and usually does in April and May, promise to pose a daunting challenge.
Daily Press