Transparency News, 10/24/2022

Monday
October 24, 2022

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state & local news stories

"The name on a hotel receipt submitted for reimbursement; the names of candidates awaiting a vote before being appointed to an advisory board; the process to be used to evaluate an employee’s performance. All were refused at one time or another as being exempt personnel records."

In Hawkins v. Town of South Hill, the court reversed a decision by Mecklenburg Circuit Court allowing the town of South Hill to withhold certain personnel information from a member of the public who had requested it under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act.  That law exempts “personnel information” from the state’s mandatory disclosure requirements, and government officials have long pointed to this exemption to justify not releasing documents related to hiring, firing and performance of government employees. 
Virginia Mercury
Despite FOIA’s policy statement saying that exemptions should be construed narrowly, it was not uncommon for public bodies to steadily push the envelope, shoehorning whatever they could into the exemption: Body camera footage of an officer’s activity on a public street; investigations into possible misconduct while checking a university student’s ID; the name on a hotel receipt submitted for reimbursement; the names of candidates awaiting a vote before being appointed to an advisory board; the process to be used to evaluate an employee’s performance; a job description; forms declaring outside employment; employee-satisfaction survey results; demographic breakdown of a public body’s workforce; a school district’s acceptable Internet use policy; surveillance video of an employee destroying public university student newspapers. All were refused at one time or another (and believe me, I could go on) as being exempt personnel records.
Megan Rhyne, VCOG's Substack Newsletter
Read the opinion on VCOG's website

Newport News is considering an amendment to the city’s charter that would give voters an avenue to recall City Council members. The City Council will hold a public hearing at 7 p.m. Tuesday for citizens to provide input on the matter, along with other proposed amendments. The hearing will be at the council chambers, at 2400 Washington Ave. Last week, the council discussed legislative priorities it would like to send to the Virginia General Assembly. The recall proposal ignited the most debate. Maror McKinley Price said a recall option could be useful to have “in the toolbag.” Councilwoman Tina Vick said she would feel more comfortable supporting the proposal if there were guidelines on reasons for recommending recalls — such as not showing up at meetings or sexual misconduct. However, she was against allowing recalls for any reason and feared people might start recalling council members because they disagreed with a vote.
Daily Press

The Montgomery County School Board approved revisions this past week to a policy that covers employee behavior in “online environments,” but the issue led to a spat between members of the elected body over whether they should have held off on the decision. The policy itself was updated to include distinctions between personal and professional use of social media channels, especially as it relates to the posting of photos from inside a school building “and/or posting information that an employee only has access to as a result of their job,” according to a brief description of the measure on the school board’s recent work session agenda. One issue of contention was recent correspondence from incoming Montgomery County Public Schools Superintendent Bernard Bragen concerning how the board should handle certain agenda items. While one group of board members argued that the recently selected district chief asked them to only consider immediate action on crucial and time-sensitive measures, the other group maintained that the communication on agenda items didn’t include specific requests.
The Roanoke Times
 

stories of national interest

Government agencies and private security companies in the U.S. have found a cost-effective way to engage in warrantless surveillance of individuals, groups and places: a pay-for-access web tool called Fog Reveal. The tool enables law enforcement officers to see “patterns of life” – where and when people work and live, with whom they associate and what places they visit. The tool’s maker, Fog Data Science, claims to have billions of data points from over 250 million U.S. mobile devices. Fog Reveal came to light when the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a nonprofit that advocates for online civil liberties, was investigating location data brokers and uncovered the program through a Freedom of Information Act request. EFF’s investigation found that Fog Reveal enables law enforcement and private companies to identify and track people and monitor specific places and events, like rallies, protests, places of worship and health care clinics. The Associated Press found that nearly two dozen government agencies across the country have contracted with Fog Data Science to use the tool.
Governing

During the COVID-19 pandemic the data dashboard became one of the most popular new gadgets across cities and counties in the United States. These days, those hastily built tools to offer some sort of window into the pandemic are beginning to go silent and dark as the virus moves from a major heath crisis to a manageable part of American life. Looking back on those months — and some of the lessons learned — data experts say the dashboard is not always the best solution to understand a crisis and the best response to it.
Governing