Transparency News 7/19/17

Wednesday, July 19, 2017



State and Local Stories

The body of a man found near the Woolen Mills neighborhood on July 4 has been identified on social media as Marvin Joel Rivera Guevara. On a GoFundMe page, people who identified themselves as Guevara’s family are asking for $10,000 to help cover funeral expenses and bury him in his native El Salvador. On the page, his brother-in-law Jaime Argueta said the donations will be given to Guevara’s parents, who also live in Charlottesville. Albemarle County police are aware of the donation campaign but have said they will neither confirm nor deny the man’s identity. Police said they are waiting for DNA test results to make an official identification.
Daily Progress

Delegates Greg Habeeb and Joseph Yost, both Republicans, reacted with heat earlier this month after learning that the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality had scheduled just two regional public hearings to solicit comment about the agency’s draft plans to address pipeline-related concerns about water quality. One hearing was set for Aug. 8 in Radford, a community not on the pipeline route. The other was scheduled for Aug. 9 in Chatham. Although DEQ declined to schedule a third public hearing, the agency’s director, David Paylor, agreed to attend two informal Aug. 10 meetings organized by Habeeb and Yost. Habeeb said Paylor will offer opening remarks, answer questions and accept written comments. DEQ spokeswoman Ann Regn confirmed Tuesday that Paylor plans to attend and participate.
Roanoke Times


National Stories
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North Carolina law is clear: Text messages exchanged by government workers are public records. But Mecklenburg County doesn’t retain texts from county cellphones and officials’ personal devices – a practice that likely destroys public records in violation of state law. On June 30, the Observer requested text messages sent or received by Health Director Marcus Plescia in January. That’s when Plescia initially learned about errors at county health clinics involving cervical cancer screenings for low-income women.
Charlotte Observer

The family of a pedestrian hit and killed by a Jacksonville police officer in May — searching for public records related to the officer’s work history — was asked to pay more than $300,000, and that was just the cost of the search.  Barbara Petersen, president of the Florida First Amendment Foundation, said the estimate could constitute a violation of public records law because it denies Phillips his constitutional right to access public records.
Florida Times-Union

A federal judge has turned down an effort to force President Donald Trump's controversial voter fraud commission to open its first official meeting to in-person, public attendance and to force disclosure of more records about the group's work. U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly said there wasn't enough indication that the panel planned to defy a federal sunshine law, particularly after the commission published thousands of pages of information online and announced plans to make more data public in a timely fashion. Kollar-Kotelly's ruling said there was no sign that the commission's procedures were impeding public debate about its actions, particularly a hotly-debated request that states turn over public voter registration data for study by the panel.
Politico

The Delaware Department of Insurance pledged to increase its attention to public information requests after a violation was determined on July 11 involving a Delmar man. While Greg Wood received requested Freedom of Information Act material from the DOI, the response missed the within 15 business days requirement that is state law.
The State Capital Daily

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has agreed to release visitor logs for President Trump's "Winter White House," his family's private Mar-a-Lago resort in West Palm Beach, and the information will be released to the public in early September. In a press release on Monday, the left-leaning nonprofit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) cited its ongoing litigation in conjunction with the National Security Archive (NSA) and the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University in DHS' decision to "turn over visitor logs for President Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence." According to the release, DHS has until September 8 to send information to CREW about "presidential visitors" of the luxurious country club and golf course, where Mr. Trump has spent more than 20 days since his inauguration. The club is owned by the Trump Organization. 
CBS News

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said that he would publicly call out lawmakers who didn’t support his 20-item legislative agenda while Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick came out swinging against House leadership during Monday appearances on the eve of Texas' special legislative session. “I’m going to be establishing a list,” he said in remarks before the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a conservative think tank. “We all need to establish lists that we publish on a daily basis to call people out — who is for this, who is against this, who has not taken a position yet. No one gets to hide.”
Governing

A left-leaning advocacy group has filed a lawsuit against Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes that seeks documents from his office detailing his ties to one of his chief political donors, the Republican Attorney Generals Association. The Wisconsin-based Center for Media and Democracy said Tuesday that it filed a lawsuit in Utah against Reyes' office. The lawsuit filed Monday seeks emails and other documents about the Republican official's dealings with the Republican attorneys general group and its partner organization, the Rule of Law Defense Fund.
McClatchy


Editorials/Columns


Richmond Auditor Umesh Dalal lived by the sword, and his position in Richmond government dies with it, too. Dalal’s reports on mismanagement in the city were unsparing, and properly so. He uncovered sloppy record-keeping in the school system, egregious abuse of gasoline credit cards, woeful procurement problems, overpayments, improperly bid contracts, inefficiency, bloat, bumbling, and more. The city’s job now is to find an auditor who can sustain Dalal’s intense focus and dogged determination.
Richmond Times-Dispatch