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The FOI ADVOCATEMarch 11, 2006 Vol. 4, No. 29The E-Newsletter of the National Freedom of Information Coalition, a unit of the Missouri School of Journalism "A government by secrecy benefits no one. It injures the people it seeks to serve; it damages its own integrity and operation. It breeds distrust, dampens the fervor of its citizens and mocks their loyalty." -- 110 Congressional Record 17, 087 (1964) (Statement of Senator Long) NFOIC NEWS
SEND US YOUR STATE’S NEWS at daviscn@missouri.edu. “Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding." -- Justice Louis Brandeis, 1928 (Articles link to external sites) TOP OF THE NEWS"Suppression of information is the surest way to cause its significance to grow and persist," the judge opined. "Clarity and openness are the best antidotes, either to dispel criticism if not merited or, if merited, to correct such errors as may be found." -- Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein in Federal District Court in Manhattan, ordering the Pentagon and other agencies to release another series of documents and videos on the detentions at Abu Ghraib prison. JUSTICE TO RELEASE WIRETAP MEMOS: Facing a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit, the U.S. Department of Justice has conceded that it could by March 3 begin releasing the internal memos relied on by the White House in justifying and authorizing the controversial “warrantless” wiretap program conducted by the National Security Agency. The consolidated lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Electronic Privacy Information Center and the National Security Archive, demands the Justice Department to provide “immediate disclosure of the internal legal justifications for the surveillance program.” “There are real secrets and convenient secrets,” said National Security Archives’ General Counsel Meredith Fuchs, in this press release. “It may be convenient for the NSA to run this program in secret, but that policy debate, and consideration of the legality of the program, should be open.” A REVEALING SERIES OF E-MAILS: The Justice Department official who oversaw national security matters from 2000 to 2003 e-mailed his former colleagues after revelation of the controversial warrantless wiretapping program in December 2005 that the Department's justifications for the program were "weak" and had a "slightly after-the-fact quality" to them, and surmised that this reflected "the VP's philosophy that the best defense is a good offense," according to documents released through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by the Electronic Privacy Information Center and joined by the ACLU and the National Security Archive. David Kris, the former associate deputy attorney general who now serves as chief ethics and compliance officer at Time Warner, e-mailed Justice Department official Courtney Elwood on 20 December 2005 his own analysis of the controversy, writing that "claims that FISA [the wiretapping statute] simply requires too much paperwork or the bothersome marshaling of arguments seem relatively weak justifications for resorting to Article II power in violation of the statute." The subject line of the e-mail was "If you can't show me yours." On 22 December, after reading the Department's talking points as forwarded by Elwood, Kris commented that the Department's approach "maybe... reflects the VP's [Vice President Cheney] philosophy that the Read the entire article, and more coverage from The Washington Post RESTORING THAT CLASSIFIED DOCUMENT: In a seven-year-old secret program at the National Archives, intelligence agencies have been removing from public access thousands of historical documents that were available for years, including some already published by the State Department and others photocopied years ago by private historians. The restoration of classified status to more than 55,000 previously declassified pages began in 1999, when the Central Intelligence Agency and five other agencies objected to what they saw as a hasty release of sensitive information after a 1995 declassification order signed by President Bill Clinton. It accelerated after the Bush administration took office and especially after the 2001 terrorist attacks, according to archives records. But because the reclassification program is itself shrouded in secrecy — governed by a still-classified memorandum that prohibits the National Archives even from saying which agencies are involved — it continued virtually without outside notice until December. That was when an intelligence historian, Matthew M. Aid, noticed that dozens of documents he had copied years ago had been withdrawn from the archives' open shelves. ANTITERROR, IRAQ, ETC.“The danger to political dissent is acute where the government attempts to act under so vague a concept as the power to protect domestic security.’ Given the difficulty of defining the domestic security interest, the danger of abuse in acting to protect that interest becomes apparent.” -- The ACLU quoting a 1972 United States Supreme Court opinion in United States v. United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan,407 U.S. 297 (1972), which re-emerged in the news recently after Justice Department lawyers blacked it out in filings in a Patriot Act case. For the evidence, see a portion of the ACLU's court filing after the Justice Dept was allowed to censor it. PENTAGON TO RELEASE GUANTANAMO DETAINEE NAMES: Pentagon officials are preparing to release the names of several hundred detainees at the U.S. detention facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the first time the government will publicly link names to previously revealed information about many captives at the island prison. The change came when the government decided this week not to appeal a federal judge's order to provide names that were redacted from documents released under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the Associated Press. Although the government has previously released thousands of pages related to hearings on whether individual detainees are "enemy combatants," it has always withheld the names of the prisoners who participated in those hearings. U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff ordered the Defense Department to release the names by March 3. Pentagon officials said yesterday that the decision not to appeal the ruling, made by the Justice Department, came over the strong objections of the Defense Department general counsel's office, which has been seeking to prevent the release of the names. GENERAL FOIA NEWSI believe there are more instances of the abridgement of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." --James Madison, speech in the Virginia Convention, June 16, 1788
GOOD LUCK WITH THAT COMPLIANCE: As New York and other states grapple with the gradually tightening requirements of the Clean Air Act, the Environmental Protection Agency is refusing to turn over records detailing the levels of smog-causing compounds found in common household and industrial products like paints and varnishes. Such volatile organic compounds are not only significant contributors to smog, but they have also been linked to a variety of health problems, including the rising asthma rates in cities like New York and Los Angeles. After trying for two years to obtain the records, New York State sued the E.P.A. on Tuesday, saying that the agency has violated the Freedom of Information Act by denying the state's repeated requests for the records. State officials say they need the records to draw up a plan to comply with strict new rules on smog-forming pollution being phased in under the Clean Air Act. The records are submitted to the E.P.A. by manufacturers of paint products. New York and California, as well as some other states on the East Coast, have stricter regulations on volatile organic compounds because they have worse summertime smog problems than other states. In refusing to turn over the records, the E.P.A. appears to be siding with paint manufacturers, which have been battling in court to prevent state attempts to regulate their products. And the paint companies have been aided in the past by at least one influential friend, Senator George V. Voinovich, an Ohio Republican who personally appealed to the E.P.A. on behalf of Sherwin-Williams, based in Cleveland. READTHEBILL, IF YOU CAN FIND IT: ReadtheBill.org called on the U.S. House of Representatives to approve by election day a resolution by Rep. Brian Baird (D-WA) to require that all proposed legislation be posted on the Internet for 72 hours before it comes up for floor debate. "It's time to stop passing bills in the dead of night that nobody has read," said Rafael DeGennaro, Founder and President of ReadtheBill.org. "We want sunshine at the Capitol by November. Any member of Congress who opposes this 72 online reform is part of the problem in Washington, D.C." Baird's resolution updates the current three-day rule in the House, which requires legislation to be available to members of Congress, but not the public, for three calendar days. The three-day rule is vague, obsolete and routinely waived, according to DeGennaro. "The three-day rule encourages the insiders game in Washington, D.C. because it says that democracy is for members only," said DeGennaro. "The new 72-hour rule would use the Internet to power democracy for all. It harnesses thousands of people to read the bills and find the shady provisions." CRADLE TO GRAVE SECRECY: ...In These Times has obtained a draft of the proposed regulations now causing widespread concern among state officials. It reveals plans to create a vast database of vital records to be centralized in Washington, and details measures that states must implement–and pay millions for—before next year’s scheduled implementation. The draft lays out how some 60,000 already strapped town and county offices must keep the birth and death records under lock and key and report all document requests to Washington. Individuals who show up in person will still be able to obtain their own birth certificates, and in some cases, the birth and death records of an immediate relative; and “legitimate” research institutions may be able to access files. But reporters and activists won’t be allowed to fish through records; many family members looking for genetic clues will be out of luck; and people wanting to trace adoptions will dead-end. If you are homeless and need your own birth certificate, forget it: no address, no service. Some of state officials around the country are questioning whether the new regulations themselves illegally tread on states’ rights. But the feds have been coy. Richard McCoy, public health statistic chief in Vermont, one of the nation’s 14 open records states, says, “No state is mandated to meet the regs. However if they don’t, then residents of that state will not be able to access any federal services, including social security and passports. States have no choice.” But while the public loses access to records, the federal government gains a gargantuan national database easily cross-referenced in the name of national security. The feds’ claim that increased security will deter identity theft and terrorism is facile. Wholesale corporate data gathering is the major nexis of identity theft. As for terrorism, all the 9/11 perpetrators had valid identification. SLATE WANTS YOUR DOCUMENTS! You may have noticed that "Chatterbox," the column I've been writing since 1998, has tapered off. That's because I've been preparing to launch a new Slate feature called "Document of the Day." The column will be a sort of cross between The Smoking Gun, the Harper's "Annotation" feature, and the Washington Monthly's late, lamented "Memo of the Month," combined with certain elements all our own that company scientists are still developing at our state-of-the-art laboratory facility in Huntsville, Ala. Barring a severe industrial accident, "Document of the Day" will debut in early March. What I need from you, dear reader, is documents. White House memos, wiretap transcripts, financial disclosure forms, college transcripts, wills, e-mails, police reports, pending regulations, expense account filings — anything sufficiently piquant to interest the lay public. I'm especially interested in documents that have not previously been made public, but I won't exclude from consideration interesting documents that the public has overlooked. I'm just as interested in government documents as I am in documents from the private sector. I intend to define "documents" as broadly as possible, so that it would include, say, a particularly asinine instruction manual or a particularly cowardly liability waiver for some consumer product, or an especially interesting billboard, or something telling that's been scribbled in the margin of a book... If you have a document that you think would be of interest to strangers, please alert me at documents@slate.com. Write "tip" in the subject line, leave a phone number where you can be reached, and indicate whether you want to be credited publicly for unearthing the document. I'll assume that anyone who doesn't indicate either way prefers to remain anonymous. Please state where you got the document; if you're cagey about that, I won't use it. We won't run any documents whose provenance is unknown... SPITZER SEEKS CLEAN AIR DOCS: Attorney General Eliot Spitzer filed suit in federal court against the EPA, charging the agency with violating the federal Freedom of Information Act by withholding the information. "The state is entitled by law to this critical information so it can effectively implement its clean air programs to preserve public health and the environment," Spitzer said. "The EPA has no grounds to deny such a request." The Clean Air Act requires manufacturers to file annual reports with the EPA listing how many gallons of paint, stain and varnish they manufacture that exceed federal limits. EPA spokesman John Millett said the agency was preparing a response and would give the state "all the information it is entitled to." If that sounds like a hedge, it probably is. The agency said earlier that the information could exclude "sensitive confidential business information such as production data." Don't even think about masking toxicity as a business secret. This is just the state's latest tangle with the EPA. New York and a dozen other states, from Vermont to California, are opposing the agency's attempt earlier this year to reduce standards for reporting toxic-waste emissions under the 1986 Toxic Release Inventory, which Congress passed as a community right-to-know law to keep people informed about toxic substances in their neighborhoods and released in the environment. New York and 10 other states filed suit last year over an EPA rule change that permits some power plants to keep polluting if they buy credits from other plants that meet standards. That saves the polluter the cost of installing expensive pollution-control equipment. SECRECY MAKES PARADE MAGAZINE: You know your cause has reached everyone’s radar when it appears in the weekly newspaper insert... AP JOINS FEMA SUIT: The Associated Press and three major media companies joined Monday the legal fight to try to force the Federal Emergency Management Agency to produce names of people who got federal aid after the 2004 hurricanes in Florida. Attorneys representing the AP, E.W. Scripps Co., Media General Corp. and the Tribune Co. filed a brief urging the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse a lower court's ruling that the names of FEMA aid recipients are exempt from disclosure requirements of the Freedom of Information Act. The News-Press of Fort Myers, Pensacola News Journal, and Florida Today, all owned by Gannett Inc., sued in federal court a year ago after FEMA had refused to disclose who received assistance and how much each one got. The newspapers argued they needed the information to examine alleged inequities and fraud in the distribution of more than $1.5 billion in assistance. At least 26 people have been charged with filing false claims with FEMA in South Florida. In November, U.S. District Judge John E. Steele agreed with government lawyers who contended FEMA needed to protect the privacy of disaster victims to comply with the federal Privacy Act of 1974. PROPAGANDA, NEWS CONTROLEPA FLACKS STILL IN CHARGE: Despite growing concerns about political interference with science, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is requiring prior headquarters approval for all communications by its scientists with the media, according to an agency email released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). EPA’s stance of screening all press interviews is at variance with recent pronouncements of scientific openness by two of its sister agencies, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). In a February 9, 2006 email to all staff, Ann Brown the News Director for the agency’s science arm, the Office of Research and Development (ORD), admonished: “We are asked to remind all employees that EPA's standard media procedure is to refer all media queries regarding ORD to Ann Brown, ORD News Director, prior to agreeing to or conducting any interviews…Support for this policy also will allow reasonable time for appropriate management response.” By contrast, less than a week earlier on February 4, 2006, NASA Administrator Michael Griffin sent an all-employee email in which he committed the agency to “open scientific and technical inquiry and dialogue with the public.” Griffin stated, “It is not the job of public affairs officers to alter, filter or adjust engineering or scientific material produced by NASA's technical staff.” Yesterday, in a Valentine Day message to all staff, NOAA Administrator Conrad Lautenbacher wrote: “Our media standards also reflect an open policy. We encourage our public affairs staff to keep abreast of media interests. I encourage our scientists to speak freely and openly. Dozens of you every day are talking to the media and providing the results of peer reviewed science across a wide variety of NOAA topics. We ask only that you specify when you are communicating personal views and when you are characterizing your work as part of your specific contribution to NOAA’s mission.” “Why are scientists at NASA free to answer questions about global warming while their colleagues at EPA are not?” asked PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch. “Science does not come in Republican or Democratic flavors; scientists should be able to discuss findings without having to check whether facts comport with management policy.” Read the entire article, and NASA’s Statement of Scientific Openness SCIENCE UNDER SIEGE, PART II: One of the benefits of writing newspaper articles is that sometimes, instead of sending anonymous insults, readers call you up and tell you interesting things. Two weeks ago, after news broke that a NASA press officer had resigned amid revelations that he'd tried to muffle the agency's top climate scientist, I got several such calls. All were from people with similar tales of government-funded scientists intimidated by heavy-handed public relations departments. Curiosity piqued, I followed one up, at least as far as the nervous scientists and the equally nervous government press officers would let me. Here's what I learned. The story begins with the publication of an article -- "Potential Environmental Impact of a Hydrogen Economy on the Stratosphere" -- in the June 2003 issue of the journal Science, which is not exactly beach reading. Yet although crammed with graphs, equations and references to chlorofluorocarbons, the basic premise isn't hard to explain: The five authors, all affiliated at the time with the prestigious California Institute of Technology, wanted to explore the potential long-term impact of hydrogen fuel cells on the Earth's atmosphere. For those who've forgotten, hydrogen fuel cells were, three State of the Unions ago, the thing that was going to save Americans from their oil addiction and stop the auto emissions that help cause global warming. Nowadays switch grass and biomass are the hot alternative fuels, but back in 2003, the president won applause for proposing "$1.2 billion in research funding so that America can lead the world in developing clean, hydrogen-powered automobiles." On Capitol Hill, there were demonstrations of one such "Freedom Car," and the president called on scientists to be "bold and innovative" in their hydrogen research. Unfortunately for the authors of "Potential Environmental Impact of a Hydrogen Economy on the Stratosphere," their research, while bold and innovative, didn't exactly mesh with the hype. According to their model, tiny leaks from hydrogen cells, if such cells are ever mass-produced, could cause serious environmental damage. But they made no suggestion of inevitability: One of the study's authors, John Eiler of Caltech, pointed out that foreknowledge of potential environmental problems could "help guide investments in technologies to favor designs that minimize leakage." Presumably thinking along the same lines, NASA, which had helped pay for the research, prepared a news release and news conference on the paper. Abruptly, both were canceled. Although "we often hear that releases are held up for political reasons," one NASA employee told me, "that one was a surprise: It went all the way to the top and then got killed." In fact, the release and the conference were "killed" by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. An official there told me this was because the office wanted to give Energy Department scientists a chance to respond to the study before it was publicized: "Our role is to facilitate interagency cooperation." Coincidentally or not, it also happens that Spencer Abraham, then the energy secretary, was that same week preparing to depart for Brussels, where he was to tell Europeans that U.S. hydrogen research proved the Bush administration cared about the environment... MORE NASA WORDSMITHERY: Top political appointees in the NASA press office exerted strong pressure during the 2004 presidential campaign to cut the flow of news releases on glaciers, climate, pollution and other earth sciences, public affairs officers at the agency say. The disclosure comes nearly two weeks after the NASA administrator, Michael D. Griffin, called for "scientific openness" at the agency. In response to that, researchers and public affairs workers at the agency have described in fresh detail how political appointees altered or limited news releases on scientific findings that could have conflicted with administration policies. Some examples have been reported to senior scientists and administrators who are assembling complaints as part of a review of communications policies demanded by Dr. Griffin, who became administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in April. Others have been described or provided to The New York Times. Press officers, who were granted anonymity because they said they were still concerned for their jobs despite Dr. Griffin's call for openness, said much of the pressure in late 2004 was placed on Gretchen Cook-Anderson. At the time, Ms. Cook-Anderson was in charge of managing the flow of earth science news at NASA headquarters. IN THE STATES“It's not the public's meeting. It's the school board's meeting." -- Hampshire County, W.Va. School board attorney Norwood Bentley From the First Amendment Center OOPS: Michigan State Police will do a second criminal history check on school employees by early next month, and this time they expect the results will be far more reliable. An initial computer check sent to the state Department of Education last summer and recently passed on to local school districts triggered an outcry from many teachers who say they were erroneously listed as convicted felons. An Ingham County Circuit judge Friday was convinced there were so many inaccuracies in the report she placed a preliminary injunction on the list to keep it from being made public and damaging the reputations of innocent public school employees. "The data is not disappearing, it's being checked for accuracy," Judge Joyce Draganchuk said. The background checks are required by a state law that went into effect Jan. 1. The first list was generated using the state police criminal database to match school employees with convicted felons, using names and Social Security numbers. Errors resulted from cross-matching common names and because of stolen Social Security numbers, police officials said. LIBRARIAN WINS MINNESOTA FOI AWARD: Librarian Colleen Coghlan is recipient of the 2006 John R. Finnegan Freedom of Information Award conferred by the Minnesota Coalition on Government Information. Coghlan is most recently a member of the faculty of the Library Science Department at the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul. She has also served during the 1980’s and 90’s as University Librarian for Metropolitan State University where she described herself as “the librarian without a library in the University without walls.” SC PAPER SEEKS REPORT ON ILLEGAL VIDEO POKER GAME: In a lawsuit filed Friday, The Beaufort Gazette is demanding that the Town of Port Royal hand over an internal investigation of the police department's potential involvement in an illegal video poker operation. The suit, filed in the Beaufort County Courthouse, came after the town denied the newspaper's Freedom of Information Act request this month to release an internal investigation of the police department, performed by the Beaufort County Sheriff's Office at the request of Port Royal Town Manager Van Willis. The call for the investigation came after a gambling ring was busted in December by the State Law Enforcement Division, in which the fiancée of a police officer was charged. Capt. Roger Karr resigned from 30 years of police service on Jan. 20. His fiancee, Kathy Rose Byers, was arrested Dec. 14 on charges of unlawful possession of eight illegal video poker machines at Amusement Services of the Lowcountry on Burton Hill Road. WHILE IOWA’S LOTTERY SEEKS SOME LEGAL ASSISTANCE: The Iowa Lottery has alerted companies making money from TouchPlay machines that The Des Moines Register has sought access to financial information about the devices under Iowa's Open Records law. The lottery's letter says it will release the information - unless the firms take legal action to block the newspaper's request. Several state lawmakers questioned the lottery's move, saying more information is needed about the TouchPlay program to help answer questions in the debate over the devices' future. An advocate for Iowa's open records law called the lottery's action "outrageous." "It is certainly inappropriate. If the Legislature intended that these records be accessible to the public, then it is not the responsibility of the government entity . . . to try to think of a way to prevent the release of the information," said Kathleen Richardson, executive secretary of the Iowa Freedom of Information Council. The newspaper requested information about how much money the machines are making by location TEXAS JUDGES’ E-MAIL IS PUBLIC RECORD: Four Texas judges must turn over to a newspaper e-mail between themselves and a lawyer under a rule that is the judicial equivalent of the state open records law. A special panel of judges assigned to the case by the state Office of Court Administration ordered the judges to produce the e-mail messages last week because they deal with a matter of legitimate public concern. The release of some e-mail messages uncovered a "fairly substantial problem in the Brazos County judiciary," said Joel White, an attorney representing The (Bryan-College Station) Eagle, which originally requested the records under the Texas Public Information Act. "Some of the e-mails were frankly pretty shocking in terms of how lawyers could be treated in this particular judge's court." Judge Randy Michel, one of the five judges whose e-mail was requested, resigned in December after the District Attorney's Office learned about messages discussing a case in his courtroom with the attorney. The Eagle filed a Texas Public Information Act request in November for e-mail messages between Michel, Judges Rick Davis, J.D. Langley, Jim Locke and Steve Smith and attorney Patricia Bonilla Harrison. The judges comprise the Brazos County Juvenile Board, which sets guidelines for assessment of juvenile offenders and voted Harrison in as the county's juvenile referee, a judgeship dealing with juvenile cases. Harrison turned down the position later that month. The paper first filed its request under the Texas Public Information Act, then refiled under Rule 12 of the Texas Rules of Judicial Administration. The request specifically said the paper "would be willing to forgo messages in which the subject matter is limited only to specific cases in a judge's courtroom. In other words, the paper is primarily seeking subject matters that are non-work related, " White said. Only e-mail from the judges' county e-mail accounts were requested. TEXAS STUDENTS USE FOI TO TELL STORY OF POLICE USE OF FORCE: Sitting in the back of a police cruiser, his green eyes burning and massive body convulsing, Barney Lee Green was certain that he was about to die. Police in the Houston suburb of Pasadena had pulled Green over on that day last November for what might have been a routine traffic stop. But neither the big man’s behavior nor the officers’ reactions were routine. Records show that as the officer who made the stop approached Green’s car, he saw that the driver was “chewing vigorously” and trying to wash down what he was chewing with a drink of water. The officer told him to spit it out; Green refused. Pasadena police carry pepper spray and Taser stun guns, so-called non-lethal weapons that law enforcement agencies across the country have issued, to give their officers in tough situations options other than drawing their firearms. Only a few weeks earlier, Green had been released from prison after serving a sentence for drug possession. Before that, prison officials say, the 38-year-old carpenter had also done time for aggravated assault. But nothing in the reports from that day that have been made public suggest that Green threatened the officer or had a weapon. He simply appears to have been a 6’ 3,’’ 300-pound man who wasn’t following police orders. The patrolman ordered Green to place his hands on the steering wheel. When he repeatedly refused, the officer sprayed him in the face with pepper spray, then stunned him twice in the shoulder with a Taser. Those initial electrical jolts apparently allowed the officer to get Green out of his car and cuff him. But the officer still wanted whatever was in his mouth. As Green lay flat on his stomach beside his vehicle, the patrolman, by this time joined by another officer, ordered him to spit out whatever he was chewing. He refused, and they stunned him again. The Taser may have subdued the big man, but it couldn’t make him spit. Police eventually handcuffed and loaded Green — and whatever he still had in his mouth —into a patrol car. Then, records show, as they were driving to the jail with the situation seemingly under control, Smith matter-of-factly announced, “I’m going to die” and began shaking and convulsing. The officer driving told officials he was only seconds away from the jail when Green made his announcement. Instead of changing course and heading to a hospital, the officer radioed for an ambulance to meet them at the jail. By the time they arrived at the jail, Green was “slumped over the seat and became unconscious,’’ records show. The ambulance got him to the hospital. He was placed on life support and died later that day. Green’s death fits into several disturbing patterns regarding the electrical pulse weapons that have come into wide use in this country in the last several years. Despite being labeled non-lethal, the weapons are being involved repeatedly in deaths, frequently in cases where the tasered person was on drugs. SECRET DEALS UNEARTHED IN FLORIDA: Secret negotiations to woo a prestigious California research firm to expand near the University of South Florida in St. Petersburg have reached the top level of state government and could include state money for operating expenses, the St. Petersburg Times has learned. Gov. Jeb Bush and state lawmakers involved in the effort won't talk about their attempts to convince Silicon Valley's SRI International to expand to Florida, citing confidentiality agreements. But on Monday, Bush invited five of the state's legislative leaders to a private meeting at the Governor's Mansion to meet with representatives of an undisclosed company considering a move to the state. Senate President Tom Lee, R-Valrico, who attended the meeting, declined to name the company Wednesday, but confirmed the discussion involved a potential project at USF. Among the key details of the negotiations with SRI, dubbed "Project Waters," that the Times has learned: The institute's Florida operation would provide up to 40 jobs. The state has been asked to consider providing as much as three years of operating expenses, in a smaller-scale version of the $369-million commitment the state Legislature approved in 2003 to woo the much bigger Scripps Research Institute to Palm Beach County. Read this from St. Petersburg Times INCIDENT REPORTS CAN BE DIFFICULT TO OBTAIN: If you want a copy of an incident report at any police department in South Carolina filed in the previous 14 days, you can walk into the department, ask the clerk for the report and receive a copy for a minimal charge. In the last couple of weeks, The Island Packet tested that state law at the Beaufort County Sheriff's Office and at the Bluffton Police Department. At both departments, staffers -- who did not identify themselves as working for The Packet -- asked for specific incident reports that had been given to reporters. They were asked to show their driver's license or give identifying information before receiving the incident reports. And they were asked the reason for wanting the reports. But South Carolina's Freedom of Information Act doesn't give departments the authority to require citizens to provide identification or a reason for the request, said Mark Plowden, a spokesman for state Attorney General Henry McMaster... IN THE STATEHOUSES: UPDATES ON FOI LEGISLATION"You're just going to have nuts out there who want to burden local governments." -- Doug Goddard, executive director of the Tennessee County Commissioners Association, on his efforts to defeat FOI reform in Tennessee. DELIBERATING THE PRIVILEGE IN VERMONT: A hotly contested bill on government secrecy is being debated by the Vermont House. The bill, passed by the House Government Operations Committee in a bipartisan 8-2 vote with one absence Wednesday, rules out the "deliberative process" exemption to open records law in the state. Under that exemption, state agencies can withhold a broad range of public documents related to decision making in government. Gov. James Douglas has opposed the bill because it would apply to the executive branch but not affect access to records of local government, the judiciary branch and the Legislature. "That wouldn't be fair," Douglas said Thursday. "The law needs to be uniform." But lawmakers and others who maintain that the bill will provide greater access to government records said that is not true. The executive branch already has ways to withhold certain documents, they said, such as documents to and from the governor and his agency heads. Unlike some other exemptions to open records laws, the privilege of secrecy has been established through court cases, particularly a Washington Superior Court decision last year, rather than through a law. Douglas pointed out that Attorney General William Sorrell's office has not only supported the use of the secrecy exemption, it has asserted its right to withhold its own documents under the exemption. "I will certainly sign a bill if it applies equally and fairly to all branches and levels of government," the governor said. That means lawmakers would have to remove some of those exemption written into the open records law, he said, such as those exclusions used by local governments. The bill was introduced in the wake of a series of cases in which the Douglas administration denied records requests under the deliberative process exemption in the last year. DISTRICT HIRES HEADHUNTER IN SECRET: The District 209 Board of Education (Illinois) voted unanimously on Monday to hire the Bickert Group, a firm specializing in nationwide superintendent searches, to seek an administrator to lead the district. The firm will be paid $14,500 for the search. The district is currently headed by an interim team led by Chief Education Officer Robert Libka and Superintendent Phylistine Murphy. Former Superintendent Greg Jackson was fired by the board in July. The decision to hire Bickert Group was made during a closed session meeting, from which the board emerged to vote on the hiring without naming the firm or stating the amount it would be paid. The board heard presentations from Bickert Group and another similar firm during a closed session at its January meeting. According to the Illinois Attorney General’s office, these meetings may have violated the Illinois Open Meetings Act. At a Jan. 25 workshop on the Freedom of Information Act and Open Meetings Act given by Terry Mutchler, public access counselor with the Illinois Attorney General’s office, she stated that all discussions of hiring of such firms must be done in open session. MONTANA GUV HINTS AT VETO OF LEGISLATIVE PRIVILEGE BILL: Gov. Dave Freudenthal says he has grave concerns about a bill that would specify that legislators' communications with their staff, constituents and consultants are privileged and don't have to be disclosed. The bill has passed both houses and is pending before the governor. Although the state constitution prohibits the governor from threatening to veto legislation, he hinted he may well be ready to grab his veto pen. Speaking to reporters at his weekly press conference on Wednesday, Freudenthal said the bill that passed this session "sets up not a privilege, but a privileged class -- and, hypothetically, I might have more to say about that later." Freudenthal said the issue of legislative privilege would be an appropriate matter for an interim study. He said such a study would let the bill get "the kind of thoughtful, deliberative consideration that you would attach to a measure which fundamentally alters the average citizen's access to the government." WYOMING LEGISLATURE OVERRIDES VETO ON LEGISLATIVE PRIVILEGE: Wyoming citizens won't have access to draft legislation and communications between lawmakers, their constituents or legislative staff after the state Legislature overrode a veto by Gov. Dave Freudenthal on Friday. Lawmakers pushed the bill out of concern that attorneys -- or reporters -- could have access to documents early in the bill-writing process, and that those documents would reflect "brainstorming" among legislators rather than their intent. Some also pointed out that the executive and judicial branches weren't held to the same standards of openness. Freudenthal didn't agree and vetoed the legislation. He said March 9 that the bill created "curtains of secrecy at the expense of the average citizen." ON THE EDITORIAL PAGESSlate’s Jacob Weisberg on what the Cheney bird-hunting saga has to tell us about the right to know: “The Bush administration's aversion to openness reached the proportions of parody last weekend, when Dick Cheney shot a man in the face with a shotgun while hunting for quail in Texas. The White House revealed nothing about the accident when it occurred, and it's entirely possible that this near-manslaughter would have gone unreported had the host of the shooting party not spoken to a local reporter about the incident a day later. Must one really argue the case that when the vice president of the United States shoots someone—intentionally or unintentionally, fatally or otherwise—that the public has a right to hear about it? It's true that there is historical precedent for Cheney's attempted cover-up. When Vice President Aaron Burr shot Alexander Hamilton in a duel in 1804, Burr's second used an umbrella to obscure the wounded man from the view of potential witnesses. Burr went home and mentioned nothing to his luncheon guest about what had happened that morning. After Hamilton died, a public cry went up and Burr fled to an undisclosed location in Georgia. A somewhat stronger American tradition, however, suggests that high officials are obliged to inform the public not just about the rare violent encounter, but also about their financial interests and the condition of their health, and above all about the workings of the government. In this regard, Cheney's role model appears to be not Burr, but the belligerent and contemptuous Spiro Agnew. Even before Sept. 11 provided an all-purpose excuse for his subterranean instincts, Cheney, like the president he serves, had made clear his 28-gauge disdain for the kind of disclosure and freedom of information that democracy demand...” FOI stalwart Paul McMasters on the dysfunctional nature of secrecy: “Let me tell you about a truly unhealthy relationship. The symptoms are well-documented: One partner skulks about suspiciously, distrustful, secretive, evasive, conversing with others out of earshot, making important decisions unilaterally, spying on the other partner, retaliating in anger when questioned or challenged. This is what's going on right now between American citizens and their government. It is not a relationship that Oprah or Dr. Phil can fix. But it must be fixed. Until both partners in this relationship are restored to equal footing, democracy suffers. As in all dysfunctional relationships, communication is the problem. Over the last few years, the information flow between the government and the public has become increasingly torturous. When voters and taxpayers seek access to government information, they usually are in for an ordeal and disappointment. When federal officials share information voluntarily, it often has a whiff of politics accompanying it...” The Indianapolis Star reveals a bit of self-interest via the Sunshine Law: It comes as no surprise that the highway construction industry is giving generously to an organization run by close associates of Gov. Mitch Daniels and dedicated to the advancement of Major Moves, his road-building initiative... ...Those restrictions would include disclosure of contributors; but Aiming Higher has been gracious enough to list its benefactors, including those who have ponied up a total of more than $300,000 to sell Major Moves. It is hard to imagine the Daniels circle withstanding public and press outcries had secrecy been attempted; but still, the transparency is appreciated... Interest groups have raised and spent money to promote government proposals before in Indiana, but perhaps never before has such an activity brought government so close to entities with money to give and money to make. This enterprise appears to meet both the law and state ethics rules regarding political contributions, at least the letter of them. But it still amounts to purchasing influence, and that's a matter not to make light of but rather to shed light on. Disclosure of donors to public policy causes that have implications for profit from government should not be subject to private whim, but required by law. Call an end to the dance. Privacy and informational policy guru Robert Gellman on the executive order on federal FOIA: “Early in Shakespeare’s play about the Danish prince, Hamlet meets his father’s ghost. Hamlet reports to Horatio, his faithful friend, that the ghost said something totally trivial. Horatio doesn’t believe it. “There needs no ghost come from the grave to tell us this,” he says. This scene comes to mind in trying to discern the implications of December’s executive order (13392) on the Freedom of Information Act. The president’s order states some platitudes about the importance of FOIA. It directs agencies to appoint a chief FOIA officer, to establish a Requester Service Center and a public liaison, to be more responsive to requesters, and to do a bunch of other procedural things. In other words, the executive order does nothing meaningful and only slightly rearranges the deck chairs. Why did the president get involved? How did FOIA get to the president’s desk? I’ve asked that question repeatedly in the FOIA community, but I haven’t gotten a convincing answer.” Subscribing to The ADVOCATE LISTSERVTo subscribe:
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