Just in case you're wondering about what I'm hiding from the school board member who made a FOIA request for all of my school-related e-mails, the answer is:
Nothing. (Cue sound of crickets chirping here.)
When Style Weekly noted this week that a School Board Member has made a FOIA request of five other board members and me, it reported that the board member has "not received one document of an e-mail between individual board members." http://www.styleweekly.com/article.asp?idarticle=16893
In fact,there are over 1,000 pages of e-mails, including many between individual board members, sitting in the school board clerk's office for public access. The 1,000+ pages took over 21 staff hours to compile and cost the system at least $807.
I've learned more about FOIA in the past few days than I ever thought I'd know, and I fully support the foundation of transparency and openness that the law requires of public bodies. So I searched my e-mails--even taking a day off from my "day job" at the Central Virginia Foodbank to make sure that I was fully compliant with the law. Now I'm going back through my correspondence to ensure that nothing was missed.
As a school board member who sends regular e-mail updates to constituents, I embrace open communication. The "Local Government Officials' Guide to the Virginia Freedom of Information Act" (reading I highly recommend and recently added to my bedsite table for handy reference) states that FOIA "continues to be...a valued guarantee of openness in government." I agree. Additionally, I understand completely why the brochure also mentions that FOIA can be "a source of legitimate frustration for local government officials" when they receive "repetitive and abusive request for records, coming more often from political opponents than from the media."
FOIA requests can take time and effort that I would like to spend on other pressing school board issues, but, everyone has a right to know about the transaction of public business, so I'll do what it takes to make sure that happens. And I won't let the aforementioned feelings of frustration get in the way of my commitment to this job. The real issues facing public schools are incredibly engaging. The side issues? That's just politics FOIA.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Fact check: I can (and did) read a lease
Like others, I have many weaknesses, but reading comprehension is not one of them. So, imagine my surprise when I read the following front page story on Friday (above the fold even--Sorry Muqtada al-Sadr, your story's just not as important to Richmond as this report from a School Board committee meeting.)
http://www.inrich.com/content/cva/ric/news.apx.-content-articles-RTD-2008-04-25-0207.html
It didn't take extensive reading comprehension skills to understand the subtitle assertion that when it came time to sign the lease for its space in City Hall, the school board "signed first, read later." I could also decipher the opening lines, "It pays to read the fine print. Richmond school officials didn't." Unfortunately, neither of these statements is true.
I read it--page by page. And other board members did too. More specifically, the school board reviewed the lease in consultation with its attorney. I most certainly DID read--and comprehend--the five page document when it was presented to the board.
At Thursday's school board Finance & Budget committee meeting (on which the RTD story was based), the discussion centered on whether the school system budget might need to include a portion of existing City Hall maintenance costs based on the lease agreement. These costs, which include a boiler replacment for the entire building, didn't change because of this lease, but the lease language illustrated that some of the existing costs could end up on the school system side of the ledger. I'm not sure how the story became "no one read the lease," because that's just not the case.
Kurt Vonnegut once said, "Just because some of us can read and write and do a little math, that doesn't mean we deserve to conquer the universe.” So don't worry, I'm not trying to get any major credit for doing the job I was elected to do. I just want the story to reflect the facts.
http://www.inrich.com/content/cva/ric/news.apx.-content-articles-RTD-2008-04-25-0207.html
It didn't take extensive reading comprehension skills to understand the subtitle assertion that when it came time to sign the lease for its space in City Hall, the school board "signed first, read later." I could also decipher the opening lines, "It pays to read the fine print. Richmond school officials didn't." Unfortunately, neither of these statements is true.
I read it--page by page. And other board members did too. More specifically, the school board reviewed the lease in consultation with its attorney. I most certainly DID read--and comprehend--the five page document when it was presented to the board.
At Thursday's school board Finance & Budget committee meeting (on which the RTD story was based), the discussion centered on whether the school system budget might need to include a portion of existing City Hall maintenance costs based on the lease agreement. These costs, which include a boiler replacment for the entire building, didn't change because of this lease, but the lease language illustrated that some of the existing costs could end up on the school system side of the ledger. I'm not sure how the story became "no one read the lease," because that's just not the case.
Kurt Vonnegut once said, "Just because some of us can read and write and do a little math, that doesn't mean we deserve to conquer the universe.” So don't worry, I'm not trying to get any major credit for doing the job I was elected to do. I just want the story to reflect the facts.
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