Transparency News 4/8/14
Tuesday, April 8, 2014
Note: "Transparency News" will be delivered via MailChimp today through Friday. I apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you.
State and Local Stories
A federal judge on Monday rejected a request by five former Virginia attorneys general to formally lend their support to former governor Robert F. McDonnell as he tries to have the federal corruption charges he is facing thrown out of court. U.S. District Judge James R. Spencer rejected the request by the lawyers to file a brief in support of McDonnell’s motion to dismiss the corruption charges, writing as his only explanation: “The Court declines to exercise its discretion to allow amicus curiae briefs to be filed in this criminal matter.”
Washington Post
Gov. Terry McAuliffe has proposed 22 amendments to the omnibus ethics bill the legislature passed in its regular session that ended March 8. A spokesman for the governor said the proposed changes were made in consultation with Speaker of the House William J. Howell's office "to address drafting errors, add family members to several sections, change the enactment date and correct several other administrative issues."
Times-Dispatch
The Virginia Community College System has agreed to suspend its policy that prompted a lawsuit by a student who complained he was prohibited from preaching on campus. According to a proposed consent order filed Friday in U.S. District Court, the 23-college system has agreed to allow the plaintiff, Christian Parks, and all other students to speak freely on campus without joining a recognized student organization or registering with college authorities in advance. In addition, the college system has agreed not to "unreasonably identify or limit the exact location" of students' outdoor speech. College officials will, however, be allowed to "enforce reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions that are not based on content, viewpoint, or speaker identity."
Virginian-Pilot
A judge yesterday refused to dismiss a libel lawsuit filed by Culpeper Supervisor Bill Chase against the commonwealth’s attorney for the county. Chase filed last year a $1.75 million suit against Commonwealth’s Attorney Megan Frederick over accusations she made in a September email. That email endorsed Supervisors Bradley Rosenberger and Larry Aylor in their bid for re-election. In lauding their qualifications, she specifically referred to the board’s approval of a $1.5 million, new building for the sheriff’s offices in which Rosenberger and Aylor cast the only opposing votes. “They lost this battle, due to incompetent and corrupt members of the Board,” Frederick wrote.
Free Lance-Star
A Campbell County judge on Monday certified charges to a grand jury against a mother and her boyfriend in connection with the tattooing of two children without consent. Details of the hearing and the testimony were not open to the public. Judge A. Ellen White closed the hearing at the request of Washburn, who cited the age of the children and the sensitive nature of the situation. The News & Advance objected.
News & Advance
After being called “X-rated” and “pornographic,” a proposed ordinance to regulate adult business in Pittsylvania County was sent back for review by the board of supervisors Monday night. “I’m too embarrassed to read it,” Westover Supervisor Coy Harville said of the revised ordinance, after calling it “garbage.”
Register & Bee National Stories
For over 15 years, the Lionel Pincus & Princess Firyal Map Division at the New York Public Library has been scanning maps from all over the world including those of the Mid-Atlantic United States from 16th to 19th centuries and even topographic maps of Austro-Hungarian empire ranging from 1877 and 1914. Most notably, the NYPL has scanned more than 10,300 maps from property, zoning, and topographic atlases of New York City dating from 1852 to 1922. There's also a "diverse collection of more than 1,000 maps of New York City, its boroughs and neighborhoods, dating from 1660 to 1922, which detail transportation, vice, real estate development, urban renewal, industrial development and pollution, political geography among many, many other things," NYPL posted in late March on its blog.
CNET News
The U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco (9th Cir.) reversed the dismissal of a challenge to the Ventura County, Calif. Superior Court’s document policy, which withheld from public inspection records filed with the court until administrators there completed processing – a procedure that could take several days, and, in some instances, much longer. In early 2012, Courthouse News Services filed the action in federal court, claiming that the Ventura County Superior Court’s policy violated its First Amendment right of public access and its right to gather and disseminate news. A lower court had previously dismissed CNS's suit on a rule that “permit[s] the federal courts to decline to decide matters ... which implicate sensitive state interests.”
Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
State Sen. Hubert Houser left the Iowa Statehouse a month ago, and he doesn't want to come back. Houser, 71, a farmer from Carson in southwest Iowa, says his health is fine. He isn't angry at Democrats or his fellow Republicans, either. It's just that after 42 years of public service, including the past 22 years in the House and Senate, he's had enough. In addition, as a minority Senate caucus member, Houser says his vote isn't needed to pass any legislation, and he isn't playing any significant role in writing any bills this session.
Governing Editorials/Columns
The Virginia Freedom of Information Act (VFOIA) is a great tool. It helps citizens and news organizations get real information to use and report on. As I cover various FOIA activities and articles, I find myself wondering about the ethics involved for the public body to try hiding documents about the public business, and otherwise actively try to circumvent the law. Some of the documentation requested can be sensitive, and there are opportunities to view such information at times when the custodian wishes to redact the portions not allowed to be divulged. If a situation is so serious that it needs to be kept secret, how can we reconcile that with an ethical professional life? What ethical responsibility is there for record custodians to not release documents and other information, given that the subject matter is either salacious or derogatory? Is the idea that the public, who rightfully should know the business of their government, can’t handle the sensitivity of certain issues?
Mark Brooks, The Next Shoe
A sharply divided U.S. Supreme Court recently invalidated another campaign-finance restriction on First Amendment grounds in McCutcheon v. FEC. Eight of the nine justices evaluated the case under the Court’s seminal decision, Buckley v. Valeo (1976). Justice Clarence Thomas, however, once again reiterated his strongly held views that Buckley was wrongly decided. For the sixth time, Thomas wrote an opinion calling into question the viability of the Buckley decision, which drew a distinction between political contributions and political spending. Thomas views Buckley as unnecessarily restricting the right of the people and others to make political contributions.
David Hudson, First Amendment Center
Note: "Transparency News" will be delivered via MailChimp today through Friday. I apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you.
State and Local Stories
A federal judge on Monday rejected a request by five former Virginia attorneys general to formally lend their support to former governor Robert F. McDonnell as he tries to have the federal corruption charges he is facing thrown out of court. U.S. District Judge James R. Spencer rejected the request by the lawyers to file a brief in support of McDonnell’s motion to dismiss the corruption charges, writing as his only explanation: “The Court declines to exercise its discretion to allow amicus curiae briefs to be filed in this criminal matter.”
Washington Post
Gov. Terry McAuliffe has proposed 22 amendments to the omnibus ethics bill the legislature passed in its regular session that ended March 8. A spokesman for the governor said the proposed changes were made in consultation with Speaker of the House William J. Howell's office "to address drafting errors, add family members to several sections, change the enactment date and correct several other administrative issues."
Times-Dispatch
The Virginia Community College System has agreed to suspend its policy that prompted a lawsuit by a student who complained he was prohibited from preaching on campus. According to a proposed consent order filed Friday in U.S. District Court, the 23-college system has agreed to allow the plaintiff, Christian Parks, and all other students to speak freely on campus without joining a recognized student organization or registering with college authorities in advance. In addition, the college system has agreed not to "unreasonably identify or limit the exact location" of students' outdoor speech. College officials will, however, be allowed to "enforce reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions that are not based on content, viewpoint, or speaker identity."
Virginian-Pilot
A judge yesterday refused to dismiss a libel lawsuit filed by Culpeper Supervisor Bill Chase against the commonwealth’s attorney for the county. Chase filed last year a $1.75 million suit against Commonwealth’s Attorney Megan Frederick over accusations she made in a September email. That email endorsed Supervisors Bradley Rosenberger and Larry Aylor in their bid for re-election. In lauding their qualifications, she specifically referred to the board’s approval of a $1.5 million, new building for the sheriff’s offices in which Rosenberger and Aylor cast the only opposing votes. “They lost this battle, due to incompetent and corrupt members of the Board,” Frederick wrote.
Free Lance-Star
A Campbell County judge on Monday certified charges to a grand jury against a mother and her boyfriend in connection with the tattooing of two children without consent. Details of the hearing and the testimony were not open to the public. Judge A. Ellen White closed the hearing at the request of Washburn, who cited the age of the children and the sensitive nature of the situation. The News & Advance objected.
News & Advance
After being called “X-rated” and “pornographic,” a proposed ordinance to regulate adult business in Pittsylvania County was sent back for review by the board of supervisors Monday night. “I’m too embarrassed to read it,” Westover Supervisor Coy Harville said of the revised ordinance, after calling it “garbage.”
Register & Bee National Stories
For over 15 years, the Lionel Pincus & Princess Firyal Map Division at the New York Public Library has been scanning maps from all over the world including those of the Mid-Atlantic United States from 16th to 19th centuries and even topographic maps of Austro-Hungarian empire ranging from 1877 and 1914. Most notably, the NYPL has scanned more than 10,300 maps from property, zoning, and topographic atlases of New York City dating from 1852 to 1922. There's also a "diverse collection of more than 1,000 maps of New York City, its boroughs and neighborhoods, dating from 1660 to 1922, which detail transportation, vice, real estate development, urban renewal, industrial development and pollution, political geography among many, many other things," NYPL posted in late March on its blog.
CNET News
The U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco (9th Cir.) reversed the dismissal of a challenge to the Ventura County, Calif. Superior Court’s document policy, which withheld from public inspection records filed with the court until administrators there completed processing – a procedure that could take several days, and, in some instances, much longer. In early 2012, Courthouse News Services filed the action in federal court, claiming that the Ventura County Superior Court’s policy violated its First Amendment right of public access and its right to gather and disseminate news. A lower court had previously dismissed CNS's suit on a rule that “permit[s] the federal courts to decline to decide matters ... which implicate sensitive state interests.”
Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
State Sen. Hubert Houser left the Iowa Statehouse a month ago, and he doesn't want to come back. Houser, 71, a farmer from Carson in southwest Iowa, says his health is fine. He isn't angry at Democrats or his fellow Republicans, either. It's just that after 42 years of public service, including the past 22 years in the House and Senate, he's had enough. In addition, as a minority Senate caucus member, Houser says his vote isn't needed to pass any legislation, and he isn't playing any significant role in writing any bills this session.
Governing Editorials/Columns
The Virginia Freedom of Information Act (VFOIA) is a great tool. It helps citizens and news organizations get real information to use and report on. As I cover various FOIA activities and articles, I find myself wondering about the ethics involved for the public body to try hiding documents about the public business, and otherwise actively try to circumvent the law. Some of the documentation requested can be sensitive, and there are opportunities to view such information at times when the custodian wishes to redact the portions not allowed to be divulged. If a situation is so serious that it needs to be kept secret, how can we reconcile that with an ethical professional life? What ethical responsibility is there for record custodians to not release documents and other information, given that the subject matter is either salacious or derogatory? Is the idea that the public, who rightfully should know the business of their government, can’t handle the sensitivity of certain issues?
Mark Brooks, The Next Shoe
A sharply divided U.S. Supreme Court recently invalidated another campaign-finance restriction on First Amendment grounds in McCutcheon v. FEC. Eight of the nine justices evaluated the case under the Court’s seminal decision, Buckley v. Valeo (1976). Justice Clarence Thomas, however, once again reiterated his strongly held views that Buckley was wrongly decided. For the sixth time, Thomas wrote an opinion calling into question the viability of the Buckley decision, which drew a distinction between political contributions and political spending. Thomas views Buckley as unnecessarily restricting the right of the people and others to make political contributions.
David Hudson, First Amendment Center
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