Transparency News, 12/15/2022

Thursday
December 15, 2022

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state & local news stories

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Anyone following happenings at the Richmond City Justice Center should come prepared with a checkbook if they’d like to request records under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act, also known as FOIA. That’s because the Richmond Sheriff’s Office has begun quoting steep fees to news organizations reporting on deaths, overdoses and assaults in the jail. In response to a Richmond Times-Dispatch request for payroll records about who the jail employs and how much they earn, Sheriff Antionette Irving’s records officer quoted a price of $1,385. Despite payroll being a record that public agencies are required to maintain, the sheriff’s records officer, Aviva Shapiro-Frye, stated that four employees would be required to pull together the document, and they would need 20 hours of labor among them. Shapiro-Frye said it would take one employee, who is on an hourly wage of $98.46, eight hours to help pull the pre-existing payroll records, a $788 task. Shapiro-Frye did not answer several follow-up questions, including as to who at the Sheriff’s Office is on a salary of more than $200,000 a year before tax, or why that highly paid employee would be tapped for the job. Asked to explain the charges, Shapiro-Frye said, “Your FOIA request would require staff to create new queries as well as create a new document, as not doing so would be even more expensive.”
Richmond Times-Dispatch

As her last act on City Council, Martinsville Vice Mayor Jennifer Bowles put forth a motion that carried, resulting in City Attorney Eric Monday’s contract being terminated effective Jan. 2. Bowles said she added the matter to the table during her comments at the end of the meeting not because of malfeasance on the part of Monday, but so that he could “go in a new direction.” Monday’s involvement in the City’s pursuit of reverting from a city to a town within Henry County would likely require a change in direction when a newly seated council is sworn in with a declared majority against continuing the legal battle against Henry County. In other matters: City Manager Leon Towarnicki notified Council members that a new handbook policy preventing a Council member from serving on Council while being employed by the city was reviewed by the Woods Rogers Vandeventer Black law firm in Roanoke and determined to be “proper under Virginia law.” Said Towarnicki: “There was nothing to indicate it was improper or inappropriate.”
Martinsville Bulletin

Ryant Washington, the chair of a state commission investigating the 2019 mass shooting in Virginia Beach, hit back at recent criticism aimed at the panel at its monthly meeting Wednesday. “If there is any indication or implication that individuals (on this commission) do not care, I would say that is certainly a false narrative,” he said during the meeting in Richmond. “I can say that we have had meetings — we have done some due diligence, we have had presentations, we’ve had speakers, we’ve had letters written,” he said. Washington said the panel was working diligently. Washington’s remarks came after a Virginian-Pilot article Sunday revealed that half of the commission’s members — a total of 10 — had resigned amid allegations from some that the commission was struggling with dysfunction and poor attendance. Washington, who previously told The Pilot that there was a range of reasons for the resignations, reiterated the point Wednesday and said the “whole message is not being told (by the media).” Jason Nixon, whose wife was killed by the gunman, harshly rebuked the commission and questioned why it wasn’t pushing for subpoena power or to have fees for record requests waived.
The Virginian-Pilot

The goal of the original resolution, said Calvin Doss, chairman and representative of the Callands-Gretna district, was to address worries residents had with members of the public appearing at meetings with weapons. The concerned residents were unaware since the public meeting space was not a school, there was no such regulation outlawing guns. Pittsylvania County Commonwealth’s Attorney Bryan Haskins addressed the board Tuesday night on the legalities and confusion surrounding the resolution adopted at the November meeting. “We have insulted some folks,” said Sam Burton, representing the Chatham-Blairs district, who noted he abstained from voting in the resolution in November. He also questioned the reason behind the the rush to implement such a measure. “Can you tell me the urgency,” he asked school board member George Henderson, who made the motion to for the gun-free zone resolution last month. “I’ll tell you when you and I go into closed session,” Henderson, of the Tunstall district, responded. In the end, the members unanimously voted to not implement the resolution until the March meeting.
Danville Register & Bee

The Loudoun County School Board on Tuesday set in motion a series of policy changes in response to the eight recommendations made by the special grand jury that investigated the division’s handling of two sexual assaults committed by the same student at two different high schools in 2021. Those recommendations including more transparency around significant incidents, a formalized process for transferring students, more direct involvement from the district’s director of safety and security, tightened controls on the apps available on students’ school-issued devices, curtailing the school district’s broad use of attorney-client privilege exemptions to government transparency law, better coordination among government agencies, stronger support for faculty and staff confronted with difficult scenarios, and not place the superintendents’ recommendations to end teachers’ contracts from the School Board’s consent agenda. As part of an effort to promote transparency, a majority of board members said the division’s own independent report commissioned last year should be released publicly in a redacted version.  John Beatty (Catoctin) said the report needed to be released in some fashion to show the public what the board knew at that time.
LoudounNow

Rebecca Layman is no longer Middletown’s town manager and treasurer. A media release distributed Tuesday afternoon by Mayor Charles Harbaugh IV does not give a reason for Layman’s departure. When reached by phone, Harbaugh said: “It’s a personnel matter and I’m not at liberty to discuss that.” Layman was hired in 2008 as Middletown’s deputy clerk, then promoted to municipal clerk. She was named treasurer in March 2014, and in July 2016 she was chosen by Town Council to serve as town manager while continuing her duties as treasurer. Middletown is just months away from creating and adopting the town’s budget for fiscal year 2024, which begins on July 1, but Harbaugh said the personnel changes should not impede the process. “No concern at all about that,” he said. “We have a CPA [certified public accountant] on staff, we’re bringing [an accountant] onto council, so we’re going to be fine.”
The Winchester Star
 

stories of national interest

The Conway (Arkansas) School Board has drawn the ire of parents and community members after changes were made to the district's email retention policy. Emails are now kept for just three days, and during Tuesday's board meeting, they addressed that change. "The policy was changed because of the harassment we were and still are getting from FOIA requests," one member said. "I can conceive of no purpose to have such a rapid destruction of records other than to interfere with the ability of people to request those records," Robert Steinbuch, a law professor at the William H. Bowen school of law, said.
KTHV