Transparency News 1/26/16
State and Local Stories
The Civil Laws subcommittee of the House Courts of Justice Committee unanimously advanced the bill that would grant citizens speaking at public meetings immunity from defamation suits. The full committee will now hear the bill, likely later this week.
The FOIA subcommittee of the House General Laws Committee has 16 bills on its docket on Thursday afternoon. You can contact subcommittee members here to voice your opinion (VCOG supports most of the bills to some degree), and please contact me if you are interested in testifying at the subcommittee. (Testifying = standing up and giving the subcommittee members your opinion about why you oppose/support a bill; nothing fancy, nothing formal, just your opinion.)
Meanwhile, consider this fact related to SB 678, which seeks to grant small localities an extra 30 days to respond to FOIA requests: The way the bill is written, these localities would get a total of 35 days to respond to a FOIA request. That would be the longest waiting period in the entire country! Maryland comes the closest with 30 days total. With extensions (14 extra days tacked onto a standard 10-day timeline), California hits 25 days, and Arkansas and Iowa hit 20. But a majority of the rest of the states — even with extensions — are at 10 days or fewer. (Note that six states don’t set a time at all, and eight states have some version of “reasonable,” “promptly,” or “as soon as practicable.”
(source: Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press Open Government Guide)
Follow access-related bills on VCOG's legislative chart
The head of the state agency that drafts laws and conducts research for the General Assembly resigned from the position Monday. Robert L. Tavenner, the director of the Division of Legislative Services since 2011, submitted his resignation in a one-page letter that was accepted by the legislature’s Joint Rules Committee in a brief meeting Monday afternoon. Lawmakers appointed Mark J. Vucci, a senior attorney who works with the budget committees, to serve as acting director until a search for a permanent replacement is completed. The Rules Committee did not discuss what led to Tavenner’s resignation, which comes a few weeks into the legislative session.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Republican Sen. Mark Obenshain raised questions in a floor speech Monday about whether Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s self-imposed gift cap is still in effect. His questions follow an Associated Press report Friday showing state Commerce Secretary Maurice Jones accepted an invitation from the Washington Redskins to watch a playoff game from one of the team's luxury boxes. The McAuliffe administration and the Redskins are negotiating the possiblity of a new stadium in Virginia. Staff of the state’s new ethics advisory council provided informal advice to the governor’s office saying the gift was allowable under the law. But Obenshain, saying ethics was a focus in McAuliffe’s election in 2013, raised questions he said haven’t been answered.
Virginian-Pilot
Controversy over the dismissal of deputy Circuit Court clerks might prompt Montgomery County supervisors to start reviewing the performance of constitutional officers. That was the final word Monday after another board of supervisors meeting dominated by anger about Circuit Court Clerk Erica Williams’ dismissal in December of nearly half her staff, and about an attempt to remove her from office because of it. Supervisors Chairman Chris Tuck concluded the session by saying that if the county is going to continue adding local tax dollars to the state-funded salaries of Williams and other constitutional officers — and was going to call at least some portion of it merit pay — then he needed a process to evaluate the officers’ performance. “While we’re looking at Erica Williams and her merit pay ... we need to decide some sort of policy overall,” Tuck said.
Roanoke Times
The BVU Authority board of directors went on record today as opposing a proposed legislative change to its makeup. The board voted to make its feelings known to state Sen. Bill Carrico, R-Galax and delegates Israel O'Quinn, R-Bristol and Todd Pillion, R-Abingdon. The three have introduced legislation to reshape the board from nine members to seven and expand representation to Washington County, Abingdon and Scott County in Virginia.
Herald Courier
The Loudoun County Board of Supervisors has approved a code of ethics that holds the supervisors to high standards of personal conduct. The 14-point policy declares that the supervisors should avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest, and that they will treat one another, the public and staff members with professionalism, courtesy and respect. It also promises transparency in conducting public business and states that the board will support the rights and recognize the needs of all residents. The code declares that the board will be transparent “to the greatest degree possible” when conducting public business and that the supervisors will enter closed session only “when clearly allowed by law to serve the public’s interest.”
Washington Post
National Stories
Want to know how your legislator [in Utah] voted on Utah Access Plus, the proposal to expand health care to about 125,000 of Utah's poorest residents? Don't bother searching. There was never an official recorded vote on the plan. In fact, the votes that doomed the health care bill were all taken in secret — with Republican House members voting in a closed-door meeting and GOP senators casting private votes after confidential discussions. It's not the kind of lawmaking that Utah voters approve of, according to a new poll for The Salt Lake Tribune and The Hinckley Institute of Politics at the University of Utah. The survey found that 91 percent of Utahns want legislative meetings to be held out in the open. "We don't plan on changing," said Senate President Wayne Niederhauser, R-Sandy, who argues that having closed-door meetings where Senate Republicans can have frank discussions of bills without fear of criticism from lobbyists or the press yields better legislation for the state.
Salt Lake Tribune
In early 2013, after two women died after abortions and the state began enforcing new rules for providers, activist Andrew Glenn sought to inspect applications to operate abortion clinics in Maryland. While information on doctors and medical practices is typically made public and often posted online, the state Department of Health and Mental Hygiene said no to Glenn, regional director for the Maryland Coalition for Life. The state argued that the potential risk of violence against abortion providers justified shielding their identities, and that releasing the names would result in fewer doctors providing the procedures. The case is now before Maryland's highest court, which heard arguments earlier this month.
Baltimore Sun
Editorials/Columns
Several measures bring back the annual effort to allow local governments to take public notices out of newspapers and bury them 15 clicks deep inside their own government websites. The bills are pitched as a way to save the taxpayers money, as if great sums were involved (they’re not). But even by that standard, the bills are a bad deal. Hiding requests for proposals, procurement notices and the like from everyone except those with a financial interest in finding them would increase the odds of collusion, high bidding, graft, and other unseemly practices.
Richmond Times-Dispatch
Does going into closed session for several hours at a time give the appearance of a government of the people, by the people and for the people? Or does it, rather, give the appearance of a government of the insiders, by the insiders and for the insiders? That's what Hampton City Council members must ask themselves about their decision to go behind closed doors for more than three-and-a-half hours — or the majority of a six-hour session — last Wednesday. The council's seven elected members each need to ask themselves whether everything they talked about in private actually needed to be closed off. Where the currency is public trust, too much secrecy can be costly.
Daily Press
ANTHONY BURFOOT won’t resign or take a leave of absence from his elected post as Norfolk’s treasurer. That’s regrettable, since federal authorities have charged him with taking nearly a half-million dollars in kickbacks and bribes. No one should be surprised that his attorney strongly supports Burfoot’s stance. “These are just charges, just accusations,” Andrew Sacks told me Monday. “He’s presumed to be innocent.” Sacks added: “Were he to resign or take a leave of absence, that could be misconstrued as an admission of guilt.” I disagree. The treasurer should seek a middle ground, one allowing him to maintain his professed innocence while at the same time bolstering the public’s trust. Such tenets are important, because Burfoot’s duties include collecting money from citizens. People can support Burfoot’s day in court – while also questioning whether he’ll handle their money properly.
Roger Chesley, Virginian-Pilot
