Transparency News, 1/5/2022

Wednesday
January 5, 2022

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state & local news stories

"Megan Rhyne, executive director of the nonprofit Virginia Coalition for Open Government, said it was mind-boggling that the state would be trying to hide the information."

An attorney for Earl Washington Jr., who came within days of being executed in Virginia for a murder he didn't commit, filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against a state agency on Tuesday because it is withholding records the attorney believes will show that authorities at the time could have gotten the right suspect.  Fairfax attorney Robert T. Hall filed the lawsuit in Richmond Circuit Court against the Virginia Department of Forensic Science, which refused to turn over the documents that Hall believes are the last set of facts that need to be revealed in how the state came close to killing an innocent man. Megan Rhyne, executive director of the nonprofit Virginia Coalition for Open Government, said it was mind-boggling that the state would be trying to hide the information.
Richmond Times-Dispatch

A reorganized Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors fired its county administrator Tuesday afternoon and removed from the record a censure of its new chair. With three new members joining the board — Jesse Barksdale, Darrell Dalton and Tim Chesher — and Vic Ingram as the new board chair, David M. Smitherman was terminated in a 4-3 vote. As Smitherman, who was hired in December 2016, exited the meeting, applause erupted from a few in the audience gathered. The meeting was broadcasted on the county's Facebook page, however the video was displayed in the wrong orientation.  Tuesday's resolution states the new board’s belief is the censure was presented with malicious intent to embarrass and discredit Ingram and should be stricken from the record. The censure came after text messages surfaced and were “construed as racist” against another board member. It also stated Ingram breached the confidentially of closed sessions and “meddled in personnel issues with county employees that are not direct reports to the board.”
Danville Register & Bee

Three Staunton city council members have called a special meeting of the Staunton City Council next week in regards to the Augusta County Courthouse in an apparent bid to improve public transparency and feedback about the plan. Last month, city council decided to postpone a vote on moving the county court operations to Verona, until they knew more on the subject. During that meeting, citizens were not able to speak or ask questions.
The News Leader

A Virginia Tech student found guilty of cheating in one of his engineering classes by the university’s honor system is taking his case to a higher court. Identified only as John Doe in lawsuit filed in Roanoke’s federal court, the student is asking a judge to overturn an “F” he received in the class and to remove a finding of academic misconduct from his record. In taking the rare step of filing a legal challenge to a failing grade, the student argues that he is the victim of unclear policies regarding the use of online sources for a class taught remotely via Zoom during the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. The student was one of about 60 members of a computer coding class who were accused of cheating in December 2020, in part through their use of Chegg.com, an online learning platform designed to help students with their homework. 
The Roanoke Times

Gov. Ralph Northam on Tuesday issued an absolute pardon to Portsmouth City Councilman Mark Whitaker, saying he believed the longtime pastor and politician was innocent of the forgery charges he was convicted of more than three years ago. “Upon careful deliberation and review of all the information and circumstances of the matter, I have decided it is just and appropriate to grant this absolute pardon that reflects Mr. Whitaker’s innocence of forgery,” the governor wrote in the pardon. As he did when the charges were first announced, Whitaker said Tuesday the case against him was politically motivated. He accused former Portsmouth Sheriff Bill Watson, lead investigator Brett Johnson and former Sheriff’s Capt. Lee Cherry of providing false and coerced information to the grand jury. The Pilot was unable to reach any of them for comment on Tuesday.
The Virginian-Pilot

editorials & columns

"Lawmakers heading to the session in a week’s time can accomplish a great deal by supporting bills that improve Virginia’s FOIA and opposing those that would carve out additional exemptions to the law."

Here’s a wish for the new year that may sound familiar to readers: Virginia’s state and local governments should resolve to be more transparent in 2022. Seems simple, right? Straightforward, noncontroversial. Well, you’d be surprised. So let this be a year when government at every level lets the sunshine in and affirms a commitment to openness, accessibility and transparency. Begin at the commonwealth’s center of power: the General Assembly. For two years, the pandemic disrupted normal operations in Richmond, with the House operating remotely and the Senate meeting in several locations.  That was all to keep members safe, which was important, but it also made engagement more complicated. Virtual committee and subcommittee meetings, while necessary in the COVID era, are a poor substitute for the sort of in-person interaction that can make legislation stronger. On the plus side — and this is a big plus — that experience should serve as to remind legislative leaders the value of broadcasting and recording meetings and keeping those meetings archived and accessible. Doing so means more Virginians can experience the debate without traveling to Richmond. A recent letter to those leaders, sent by Megan Rhyne on behalf of the openness coalition Transparency Virginia, offers some other ideas for strengthening the legislature’s commitment to transparency. More than that, lawmakers heading to the session in a week’s time can accomplish a great deal by supporting bills that improve Virginia’s FOIA and opposing those that would carve out additional exemptions to the law.
The Virginian-Pilot

It is a frightening thought: military-grade weapons, lost by the U.S. government and appearing again on the streets. An Associated Press investigation found assault rifles, machine guns, handguns, armor-piercing grenades, artillery shells, mortars, grenade launchers and plastic explosives have, indeed, gone missing. Even more frightening, the AP’s AWOL Weapons investigation showed reports of that missing weaponry were not reaching members of Congress. It is a frightening thought: military-grade weapons, lost by the U.S. government and appearing again on the streets. Department of Defense officials were keeping track (or not) of missing firearms and explosives with paper records. Only after being called out by the AP’s investigation are they digitizing the effort, with a central logistics operations center now collecting and verifying serious incident reports. Those reports now are, though had not always been, going to the top of the chain of command.
Daily News Record