Transparency News 9/3/15

Thursday, September 3, 2015

 

State and Local Stories


The longest-serving member in the history of the Roanoke County School Board told its newest member, appointed Wednesday, that he saw a lot of similarities between the two. Moretz, 40, was one of six candidates the board considered for a 14-month appointment to fill the seat vacated last month by Drew Barrineau, who resigned because his Norfolk Southern Corp. job was transferred. Moretz and the other applicants were interviewed privately by board members on Monday. On Monday the board spent between 30 to 45 minutes with each of the six candidates who remained after one withdrew and the other was deemed ineligible. The board continued its discussions in closed session on Wednesday. After reaching consensus, the board contacted Moretz and made attempts to contact the remaining applicants before returning to open session, where the formal vote was taken. Megan Rhyne, executive director of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government, said the board’s closed session actions were legal because state law gives elected bodies wide latitude about whom they can talk with in private. She said the way the board acted is consistent with how many governmental bodies act. The larger issue, she said, was the “general secretive nature of appointments to a position that would normally be elected.”
Roanoke Times

Two Stafford supervisors suggested the county school system have an independent auditor look at its finances in the wake of the schools’ announcement of millions in leftover money. School Superintendent Bruce Benson was informed in late June that the school system had $9 million in leftover money at the end of this fiscal year, which was reduced to $8.3 million after some of the savings were used for health care costs and other things. When savings came in from salary lapses, the money was transferred for other school expenses. Salary lapse occurs when a more-experienced employee is replaced by a less-experienced one who earns less. The practice was legal from an audit perspective, but the School Board wasn’t able to provide the input it should have for these budget transfers, Schools Superintendent Bruce Benson said in his update to supervisors. “The problem is that it occurred in a way that wasn’t transparent,” Benson said.
Free Lance-Star


National Stories
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A federal judge, whose ruling against the National Security Agency's bulk collection of telephone data was overturned by an appeals court last week, maintained Wednesday that he believed the surveillance program violated the constitutional rights of "tens of millions of people every single day." With the case back in his court, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon urged conservative activist Larry Klayman to amend his challenge to the NSA program, suggesting that he would again rule to block the bulk collection before it expires Nov. 29. Beginning then, as directed by Congress, the data will be retained by the phone companies, not the government. "The clock is ticking, Mr. Klayman," Leon told the activist. Leon then issued a stern warning to government lawyers at a brief hearing, saying that he would move quickly to rule again on the matter and not tolerate delays designed to keep the program running until the November deadline.
USA TODAY

Julian Assange is now in his fourth year of living in the Ecuadorean Embassy in London, and leaked documents reveal that the WikiLeaks founder hasn't been the easiest guest—and that diplomats were working on creative ways to get rid of him. The documents show that as embassy staff started to worry about his behavior, they hatched escape plans, including having Assange sneak past waiting police officers in fancy dress, having him flee over rooftops to a helipad, obtaining diplomatic immunity by appointing him as Ecuador's representative to the UN, or smuggling him out in a diplomatic bag, the Telegraph reports. The latter plan was rejected because police had technology that could detect body heat.
Newser

A number of college coaches—including such architects of national champions as Geno Auriemma (UConn basketball), Rick Pitino (Louisville basketball), and Jimbo Fisher (Florida State football)—prohibit their players from tweeting during their sports' seasons. It's not a rule that seems immediately ridiculous, given that college athletes work under a number of other behavior restrictions and that a number of young athletes have landed themselves in the soup by tweeting intemperately. But as ESPN's Mina Kimes reports, these coaches' rules may well violate a little something called the Bill of Rights. But what about the other restrictions on behavior (enforced curfews, practice schedules, etc.) that athletes have long agreed to? "Unlike social media bans, those rules don't invalidate their constitutional rights," Kimes writes. In other words, perhaps, no one has a constitutional right to sleep in.
Slate

An Illinois city agreed Wednesday to pay $125,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by a man whose home was raided by police over a Twitter account he created depicting the city's mayor as a fan of drugs and alcohol. The deal calls for the city of Peoria to send its police department a directive emphasizing that parody doesn’t fall under an Illinois statute of regulating false personation of a public official, which was used to obtain warrants to arrest Jon Daniel. The deal does not include an admission of wrongdoing by the city. The City Council still needs to approve the deal, but an attorney for the city told the Associated Press the settlement made financial sense. Daniel's attorneys called the deal “a civics lesson” for governments around Illinois that parody isn’t a cause for a police investigation.
Fox News

Editorials/Columns

The old adage “praise in public, criticize in private” probably has value in dealing with most everyday dealings people have. But should the same apply to the performance of public officials? Should a public official, particularly one in a leadership position, be protected from complaints aired at a public meeting? That’s what at least one member of the Spotsylvania County School Board was saying when a speaker began to complain about a school principal at a recent meeting. A parent criticized a high school principal but was cut off and told not to mention anyone’s name. Complaints about individuals should be made privately to administrators—not at public meetings, the speaker was told.
Free Lance-Star