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Records/Archives in the News Part 01 01/17/00
Records/Archives in the News r991212c
There are 3 stories in this posting
Spartanburg Herald Journal 12/12/99
Local record requests often draw suspicion
Kansas City Star 12/12/99
Editorial: Good decision on public records
Sunday Times (South Africa) 12/12/99
Doctor to hand back files after car park row
_________________________________________________________________
Spartanburg Herald Journal 12/12/99
Local record requests often draw suspicion
by Diane Norman
Middle Tyger Bureau Editor
<SNIP>
If you live in a small town in Spartanburg, Union or Cherokee counties, you
probably can?t get a police report without talking to the chief.
Want a copy of the minutes from the last town council meeting? Better call
ahead to make sure the clerk is in.
And if you refuse to give town officials your name, don?t be surprised if
they ask police to run your license tag number through a computer to find out
who you are.
That?s what reporters for the Herald-Journal learned when they requested
documents from 18 municipalities in the three-county area on Sept. 29.
<SNIP>
<SNIP>
Herald-Journal employees visited places where they weren?t likely to be
recognized, and they didn?t identify themselves as reporters when they
requested documents.
The state?s Freedom of Information Act allows any person to obtain public
documents without divulging his name, occupation or purpose for requesting
the records.
Herald-Journal reporters obtained meeting minutes in 11 of the
municipalities. Of the seven towns that did not comply, two do not have
offices that are staffed full-time - Reidville and Central Pacolet.
<SNIP>
<SNIP>
One of the most unusual responses came from tiny Campobello, population 491.
The town clerk couldn?t give reporter Bridget Bradburn a copy of council
minutes because the clerk works on the minutes at home, and the documents
were at her house.
<SNIP>
<SNIP>
In a number of towns with populations less than 5,000, no one staffs the
police department on a regular basis, so police reports often are
inaccessible.
In other communities, reporters were told the police chief is the only person
who can release information, and chiefs were sometimes out of town or on
patrol.
Jay Bender, lawyer for the South Carolina Press Association, said police
logs, police reports and meeting minutes should be available for immediate
inspection.
Towns can keep copies of those reports in loose-leaf binders at the front
desk, so anyone can inspect them, Bender said.
?The guiding principle in the interpretation of the FOI is that public
records and public meetings should be open to citizens,? Bender said. ?The
difficulty arises when governmental entities develop a proprietary sense
about the records and resist the notion that the public business is the
public?s business.?
In many instances, strangers asking for records were treated with suspicion.
Though many police agencies expected media inquiries, they were more guarded
when responding to citizen requests.
Reporter Bradburn encountered resistance when she went to Inman and asked to
see the crime log for the past few days.
She approached Lt. Craig Spicer, who asked why she wanted to see the log.
?I told him I wanted to look through it for the most recent property crime,?
Bradburn said. ?He told me he couldn?t remember one recently. I asked if I
could look through the log anyway.
?Spicer told me I would have to speak with the chief. I asked if the chief
was available, and Spicer told me he was in Columbia for the rest of the
week.
?I told him the log is supposed to be available to the public under the S.C.
FOIA. He said he knew that, but ?The chief just likes to know who is going
through the log.? ?
Inman Chief Glenn Henderson, however, says he has improved Spicer?s
understanding of public records law.
Spicer told him about the encounter with Bradburn, Henderson said.
?I corrected him on the procedure on it - that people do have the right to
come in and look at some records,? Henderson said. ?We?ve got that covered
now.?
>SNIP>
<SNIP>
?We are by nature suspicious of requests that aren?t normal requests,? said
Howard Duvall, executive director of the South Carolina Municipal
Association.
?The average Jane...does not just walk in and ask for a police report,?
Duvall said.
The Municipal Association holds frequent seminars to acquaint its members
with the FOI and the principles of open government, but the training is
voluntary.
?You?ve got 1,600 municipal elected officials out there,? Duvall said, and
about half have not had association training.
Responses to FOI requests also may be related to the nature of the community,
he said.
In very small towns, a mayor or clerk may know nearly every resident, Duvall
said. So when a stranger wants town information, the official becomes curious
about the questioner?s purpose.
<SNIP>
<SNIP>
Duvall said there needs to be some room for the common-sense application of
the law.
For instance, if a man wearing a ski mask and camouflage clothes comes into
City Hall and asks for the names and addresses of all the council members,
Duvall thinks the clerk should refuse.
?The law doesn?t say, ?If you have suspicions, don?t release it,?? Duvall
said, ?... but you?ve got to apply reason to some of this stuff.?
What is reasonable depends on individual circumstances and the nature of the
material being requested, Duvall said.
?I think that in all cases, (meeting) minutes would not be threatening to
anybody,? Duvall said.
But Herald-Journal reporters did find resistance to the release of those
documents in more than one town.
When reporter Tom Langhorne went to Cowpens City Hall, clerk/treasurer
Shirley Reynolds retrieved the minutes he requested, then asked for
Langhorne?s name, address and the reason he wanted the documents.
Langhorne told her the state?s Freedom of Information Act entitled him to the
records without giving her his name.
Reynolds refused to give him the documents if he wouldn?t give her the
personal information on a city FOI form.
Reynolds, who has worked for the city of 2,400 residents for 30 years, told
Langhorne that no one else had ever refused to give a name and address when
requesting public documents.
In an interview last week, Reynolds said she acted on the advice of the
municipal judge, Chester Brown, whom she called while Langhorne was in her
office.
Reynolds said she was irritated by Langhorne?s refusal to give his name, and
she thought he was acting suspicious.
?He hit me wrong that way, just with his sneaky ways,? Reynolds said.
And she said she was aware that Langhorne is a reporter.
?We ran his tag number to find out who he was to start with,? she said.
<SNIP>
<SNIP>
Many times, the people who want public documents are political opponents or
disgruntled citizens who want to make trouble for an official, Duvall said.
That kind of request is not welcomed warmly.
?We understand the public has a right to public information,? Duvall said,
?...but you?re still dealing with a lot of different personalities.?
Reporter John Boyanoski also aroused suspicions when he went to Wellford City
Hall for a copy of meeting minutes.
The woman behind the front desk told him flatly he could not have the
minutes.
She said the clerk who handles the documents was out sick, and she didn?t
know when she?d return to work.
As Boyanoski turned to leave, the woman, who had not identified herself, told
him that even if the clerk had been in, he couldn?t get the minutes for
?about a week? under the Freedom of Information Act.
Boyanoski disagreed - telling her that the act requires minutes to be on hand
at all times.
The woman said she had just read the act, and Boyanoski countered that he had
a copy, too. They reached a stalemate.
The woman asked Boyanoski?s name, and he responded, ?John.?
Then she asked who he was with. He said that didn?t matter and asked for the
woman?s name.
She said her name didn?t matter, either.
When he returned to the Herald-Journal office, he discovered he?d been
talking to Mayor Sallie Peake.
In a follow-up interview, Peake said she didn?t tell Boyanoski her name
because she didn?t know him, and she thought he was acting strange.
?I said, ?Something with that guy is not on the level. He?s trying to trap me
in something,?? Peake said.
If a city police officer had been close by, Peake said she would have gotten
Boyanoski?s license tag information.
?I don?t know who he was. How would I know what he had in his pocket?? Peake
said. ?He could have been a hit man, from the looks of it. ... People are
doing that now.
?To me, he looked like a hit man or a Ku Klux Klansman.?
<SNIP>
________________________________________________________________
Kansas City Star 12/12/99
Editorial: Good decision on public records
<SNIP>
Missourians will have better access to public records as the result of a
decision of the state Supreme Court. Information held by public officials,
the court ruled, should be available for inspection by citizens.
That may appear obvious under provisions of the open records? provisions in
state law. But the Cole County sheriff disagreed.
The law enforcement officer filed suit in Cole County Circuit Court to avoid
complying with a request by a Jefferson City television station for a
videotape of a state legislator being booked for suspected drunken driving.
The sheriff?s contention was upheld by the circuit court. The judge ruled the
tape was not subject to the law because it was made in the county jail?s
booking area as a security measure. It was not, the judge said, an official
arrest record and, therefore, not available to the public.
The Missouri Court of Appeals upheld the circuit court.
Those findings were unanimously rejected by the Supreme Court. The court
found, in effect, that a record in possession of public officials should be
available to citizens. The court did not draw a distinction between the
jail?s internal matters and official arrest papers.
The decision should be encouraging to citizens who want public information.
Citizens are entitled to all public records, with certain exceptions.
Officials should not attempt to evade their requests.
Indeed, public officials should remember that the state open meetings and
open records law directs the statute ?shall be liberally construed.?
<SNIP>
<SNIP>
The state legislature has mandated open government. The Missouri Supreme
Court has, in the Cole County case, reaffirmed this policy. Now it is up to
all public officials to know and comply with the open meetings and open
records act.
<SNIP>
________________________________________________________________
Sunday Times (South Africa) 12/12/99
Doctor to hand back files after car park row
by Gillian Anstey
<SNIP>
AFTER a tense episode involving the Flying Squad and cars blocking entrances
and exits to a medical practice, the Johannesburg High Court this week
ordered a doctor to return nearly 8 000 patients? files he had removed from
the premises.
Friday, November 26 was Dr Leon Fouché?s last day at Medicross in Brixton,
where he had worked for five years. In the afternoon, he asked clinic manager
Pieter Hayton to move his car, which was partially blocking the back entrance
to Medicross?s reception area.
Then a bakkie drove into the Collins Street premises and Fouché began
removing the files from cabinets in the reception area and loading them into
the vehicle. Hayton then locked and chained the back gate and contacted the
Flying Squad.
Gerhard Pretorius, Medicross?s regional manager, then blocked the back
entrance with his own car. Police arrived but said that because it was a
civil matter they were not going to get involved.
By then all the files were in the bakkie, but Pretorius refused to move his
car. Fouché told the driver of the bakkie to bump Pretorius?s car out of the
way and shouted: ?Go, go, go!? to the driver.
Fouché said in court papers he needed the files to carry on his practice. He
said Hayton had accused him of stealing the files, which was not possible -
he could not steal his own possessions.
Prior to hearing Medicross?s urgent application for the return of the files
this week, acting Judge Eben Jordaan asked their advocates: ?Isn?t this a
childish tiff between two hardheads? Isn?t this a matter that can be settled
via a photostat machine? Why waste costs on such absolute nonsense??
But the case was heard and Fouché was ordered to return the files.
Dr Lizette de Lange, general manager of medical affairs at the Medicross
Healthcare Group, said the matter was taken to court after Fouché had refused
them access to his new practice to photostat the files, despite an agreement.
?A fair amount? of the files he took were of other doctor?s patients.
<SNIP>
PETER A. KURILECZ CRM, CA
PAKURILECZ@AOL.COM
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