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FOIA Friday: Costs of withheld UVA shooting report and reflections on Virginia FOIA's evolution • Virginia Mercury [1]
['Staff Report', 'More From Author', '- March']
Date: 2024-03-15
One of the less noticed features of the Virginia Way is the long-running tendency of the commonwealth’s leaders to conduct their decision-making behind closed doors. While the Virginia Freedom of Information Act presumes all government business is by default public and requires officials to justify why exceptions should be made, too many Virginia leaders in practice take the opposite stance, acting as if records are by default private and the public must prove they should be handled otherwise.
In this feature, we aim to highlight the frequency with which officials around Virginia are resisting public access to records on issues large and small — and note instances when the release of information under FOIA gave the public insight into how government bodies are operating.
UVA shooting report that university is still withholding cost $1.5 million
An external review of a November 2022 shooting commissioned by the University of Virginia cost $1.5 million, 13NewsNow found. Despite initially announcing it would make the report public, the university has been withholding the investigation since officials received it in October 2023.
The shooting, which was allegedly carried out by a former university football player, occurred on a crowded bus of students returning from a school-sanctioned trip to Washington, D.C. It left three students dead and two others injured.
13NewsNow reports that of the $1.5 million paid by the school for the investigation, roughly $1 million went to law firm Quinn Emanuel, $432,000 went to Vinson & Elkins and $38,000 went to Christian Barton.
Richmond charges $3,866 to review emails related to FOIA requests
The city of Richmond charged the Richmond Times-Dispatch $3,866 to review email correspondence related to FOIA requests made to the city, according to the newspaper.
The charge was one example of what the Times-Dispatch called “a pattern of city officials denying, delaying or charging exorbitant amounts for accessing public records.”
Richmond is facing a whistleblower lawsuit from its former FOIA officer, Connie Clay, who claims the city fired her for “refusing to engage in illegal and unethical activities in violation of FOIA.”
Richmond City Councilman Andreas Addison told the Times-Dispatch he is considering asking for an emergency audit of the city’s FOIA request process.
“What’s at stake is the need to restore trust in our government operations and response to the press,” Addison told the newspaper. “We need to restore [sic] that people can trust that the city is providing the right information in a timely manner that can answer the questions being asked by its people.”
The Mercury’s efforts to track FOIA and other transparency cases in Virginia are indebted to the work of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government , a nonprofit alliance dedicated to expanding access to government records, meetings and other state and local proceedings.
How Virginia FOIA has been strengthened over the years
Prior to 1990, Virginia had few safeguards in place to ensure that public officials didn’t abuse their right to go into closed session to discuss specific matters of public business exempted from disclosure requirements in the Freedom of Information Act.
But after a study committee began considering whether closed sessions should be taped so that a judge could review them in the case of a legal challenge, the General Assembly passed a law requiring members to certify that only legitimate issues were discussed in closed session. Any official who thought the body had violated FOIA in closed session was also required to voice that view.
That episode is just one of several cited by Smithfield Times Publisher Emeritus John Edwards in a column written for Sunshine Week about how Virginia’s FOI law has been strengthened over the past few decades.
“Virginia FOIA is stronger today than it was in the late 1970s when I — and like-minded people across Virginia of my generation — began lobbying legislators, badgering supervisors and council members and making a general nuisance of ourselves when information was withheld,” wrote Edwards.
Have you experienced local or state officials denying or delaying your FOIA request? Tell us about it: [email protected]
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