The gentleman above probably is not how most of us define "gang member," yet when I searched for Utah gang images on Google, this is one of the photographs which appeared.

Some of the defense attorneys I spoke with last week would use this as a point. How do we know who is being called a gang member?

Reporter Melinda Rogers and I asked that in an article about gang databases and a forthcoming statewide database. The federal government regulates who police input into such a database and how those names can remain.

If you want to know whether you're in the database, the easiest thing to do is call your local police jurisdiction and ask. If you don't receive an answer, you can file a request under the Utah Government Records Access and Management Act. But that may not yield your answer, either.

The act grants you some records when you are the subject. But the law also permits law enforcement to withhold records deemed part of ongoing investigations.

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, Police, technology

The State Records Committee on Thursday ordered the University of Utah to say what it paid a women who lost limbs to a flesh-eating bacteria.

In a unanimous vote, the committee said the dollar figure is a public record and must be disclosed. The committee did not address whether other terms of the settlement must be released.

The university can appeal the decision by filing a lawsuit in state court.

Lisa Speckman lost three limbs from a flesh-eating bacteria she contracted while under the care of university-trained medical staff. The Tribune sought terms of the legal settlement between the university and Speckman and her family.

In written denials and at Thursday's hearing, a university attorney argued the settlement, including any money it paid, was a health record protected by federal law. The Speckmans' attorney also wrote the committee, saying disclosing the records would invade the family's privacy.

Speckman's husband, Stephen Speckman, is a former Deseret News reporter who himself used state and federal record laws to pry information from the government.

The Tribune argued money is not a health record. Also, the newspaper wanted the settlement to help report on the larger issue of medical mistakes, the consequences and how to prevent them.

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, State Records Committee

As a newspaper reporter, Stephen Speckman exposed how government functioned and the mistakes it make.

Now Speckman is asking for the result of one government mistake to remain hidden.

Speckman's attorney has sent a letter asking the State Records Committee to not order the release of a legal settlement between Speckman, his wife and the University of Utah.

Speckman's wife, Lisa Speckman, lost three limbs from a flesh-eating bacteria she contracted while under the care of university-trained medical staff. The university is refusing to disclose what it paid to the Speckmans to settle their lawsuit.

The Tribune has appealed to the records committee and has a hearing before it on March 12. In a letter to the committee, a copy of which is attached below, the Speckmans' attorney has claimed disclosing the money paid and other terms will invade the couple's privacy. The Tribune has argued the law requires government to disclose the public money it spends.

Stephen Speckman was a respected military reporter for Deseret News. He left the newspaper earlier this year.

On online search for Stephen Speckman's articles reveals he made regular use of the Freedom of Information Act and the Utah Government Records Access and Management Act.

— NC


Speckman1.pdfSpeckman2.pdf

Labels: GRAMA, State Records Committee

From our woman on The Hill, Cathy McKitrick:

A bill that would restrict public access to some government records, cleared the Senate Government Operations Committee on Tuesday after significant changes were made.
"The measure originally sought to prevent the balancing test" weighing public access vs. privacy interests, said Jeff Hunt, an attorney representing the Utah Media Coalition. The coalition initially opposed HB122, which is sponsored by Rep. Douglas Aagard, R-Kaysville, and backed by state Attorney General Mark Shurtleff.
When a government record is classified as protected or private, someone can argue that the public benefit of disclosing the information outweighs the need for privacy.
After reaching consensus on new language for the bill Monday, Hunt said he is on board with what he views as a fair compromise.
"We had frank discussions that went clear into the night," Hunt said, crediting Shurtleff for hearing the concerns of media and other public interest groups.
The new version of the bill requires that only one category require clear and convincing evidence for disclosure -- namely, records that would jeopardize the life and safety of an individual.
"We feel this compromise gives protection in investigations where a life could be at stake," Shurtleff told committee members Tuesday.
For seven other categories, the requestor would have to prove by a preponderance of the evidence -- or slightly more than 50 percent -- that the records should be made public, Shurtleff said.
The measure moves to the full Senate for further consideration.

Labels: GRAMA, Legislature

Thank God it's Monday. You don't hear that often, but after everything that happened to me last week on the records front, I want a fresh start.

I confess I don't like House Bill 122, though I'm trying to remember the arguments in favor of it. The bill passed the House last week, but it's still just a problem for another day.

Last week, I received word from the Ogden Records Board that it denied my appeal for certain employment records related to former police officer Ken Hammond. Ogden does not subscribe to the State Records Committee appeal system, so The Tribune has to file suit against the city if it wants to pursue this further. My bosses have not given me an indication the newspaper will do that.

The board's denial, a copy of which is attached below, probably ensures the pending criminal and civil court cases against Hammond will be the only vehicles for learning details of his time on the police force.

To ensure I would be beaten down by three levels of government, the feds sought to crush my spirits, too. The Mine Safety and Health Administration sent me a copy of a 2001 report about the Martin County Coal impoundment failure, which was one of my first FOIA requests to Obama Administration. The problem is: I asked for the 2003 report — which the government (now under two presidents) has been withholding from release.

And I'm not the only who had problems last week. Check out this article about meetings in Highland. In my experience, when one member of a governing body complains about transparency issues with the rest of the board, there's some kind of problem.

— NC

OgdenRecordsReviewBoardDecision.pdf

Labels: Crime, FOIA, GRAMA, Legislature, Obama, Open and Public Meetings Act

The legislation which would limit access to some public records has passed the Utah House and that's intensifying opponents.

Joel Campbell, an assistant professor of communications at BYU, sent an e-mail to journalists on Thursday asking for them to get loud and organized. Maybe Campbell was inspired by some fishermen.

The Spectrum in St. George published an editorial Thursday opposing the bill. Other Utah newspapers have published similar editorials.

The attorney general's office, which is backing the bill, says House Bill 122 will preserve attorney work product and protect criminal investigations.

An excerpt of Campbell's e-mail and his talking points are below.

— NC

Dear Friends of Open Government

You can make a difference by making a call or writing something today. Its (sic) time to alert everyone we know, citizens, journalists and officials about HB122, sponsored by Rep. Doug Aagard, R-Kaysville.

HB122 passed the House yesterday. We need to contact Senators. I have attached new talking points that address the bill as amended in the House. Please editorialize on it, blog about it, facebook it, twitter it and distribute widely and, most importantly, call, fax or write your senator! We should also call and write Mark Shurtleff, whose office is pushing this bill and ask the Governor to veto this bill if it comes to his desk. We are going to lose this one if we don't start communicating our concerns to senators.

H.B.122.Talking.Points.02.18.09.pdf

Labels: Crime, GRAMA, Legislature

The Salt Lake City Police Department has written a four-page policy on how the new Pioneer Park cameras are to be used.

A PDF of that policy can be found here.

The policy does not address what happens when someone outside the police department wants a copy of the video.

When I asked police Chief Chris Burbank about this Wednesday, he described the recordings as "private" information, similar to that of calls to a police dispatcher.

But I have received copies of Salt Lake City dispatch recordings before via a GRAMA request.

Martha Stonebrook, a senior attorney for the city, gave a more-measured response when I called her Wednesday. She said requests would be reviewed on a "case-by-case basis." That's in tune with GRAMA.

The law says records are public unless they are expressly exempt from disclosure. The catch is there are lots of statutes that can be interpreted — correctly as not — as closing a record. Hypothetically, the city could deny record requests for video footage and argue the footage invades someone's personal privacy.*

But that would seem to play into the hands of the ACLU, which has made a similar argument against having cameras at all.

The city may be on firmer ground if someone requested footage of a suspected crime. GRAMA makes exemptions for evidence in a criminal case.

— NC


* I am not an attorney and frequently remind myself of that.

Labels: Crime, GRAMA, Police, SLC

An open letter to former Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson:

Dear Mr. Anderson:

Thank you for your recent letter concerning The Tribune's coverage of Wally Bugden. It's always nice to hear from readers. Hell, at this point, it's nice to have readers.

While I have no capacity to speak for The Tribune as a whole, I say you're free to criticize the newspaper. The Tribune shines a critical light on many and is not above accepting the same.

But can you shoot a little bit of your criticism toward the city of Ivins?

Ever since Mr. Bugden was arrested, The Tribune's crime desk has been asking Ivins police to give us a statement, a police report, a poem, a crop circle pattern, an interpretive dance or something else indicating what happened.



Thus far the answers have all been no. The police department has denied our GRAMA request.

That means we don't know the facts of Mr. Bugden's arrest — only that he was booked into the Washington County jail on suspicion of public intoxication.

That could mean he was harmless in the lotus position, as you claim.* Or he was running drunk up Snow Canyon Parkway, shouting the rules of evidence and asking Relief Society members to tug on his bow tie.

I'm making up that latter version of events. But I can't verify your information, either, and everyone is left to wonder what really happened.

Let me know if you hear anything from Ivins. Thanks again for writing. And, for heaven's sake, please keep reading.

Sincerely,

Nate Carlisle
Salt Lake Tribune


*If true, then a guy with access to a free legal defense decides to get drunk and ornery and the the best he can think of is the lotus position? Public intoxication is wasted on the middle-aged and well educated.

— NC

Labels: Crime, GRAMA

The state's two big newspapers published editorials today opposing HB122.

Click here to read the Salt Lake Tribune editorial.

The Deseret News editorial is here.

While HB122 might discuss hiding documents, Cache County opted to hide its discussions over a new county attorney. News organizations asked the county council to hold the discussions in public.

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, Legislature

UPDATE: A Standard-Examiner editorial on Wednesday voiced strong opposition to HB122. The newspaper also published this editorial cartoon.


The debate over public records legislation sounds a lot like an argument about whether government is always right.

HB122 — filed at the request of the Attorney General's Office — would remove avenues of appeal for records associated with law-enforcement proceedings, government audits and personnel matters.

In other words, if the bill passes, and you want a police report or a copy of a government audit, and the government denies your request, you may be out of luck.

There's no more administrative appeals — which is currently a cornerstone of Utah's records laws, called GRAMA. Or, from another perspective, there's no more "second guessing."

From the Standard-Examiner:

Patrick Nolan, of the state Attorney General's Office, said during a legislative committee meeting Monday morning that the court system and state boards are "second-guessing" law enforcement's classification of restricted documents.

Nolan may have been talking about the Utah Supreme Court. In a 2008 ruling on a GRAMA lawsuit, the supremes effectively said just because a government agency classifies a record as exempt from disclosure, doesn't mean the government is correct.

I cited this ruling today when I appeared before Ogden's records board. Ogden has classified some personnel records as exempt from disclosure. I argued the city is wrong and the documents should be disclosed.

If HB122 passes, I may not get to make this argument again. The government will be right — whether it is or not.

— NC

Labels: Crime, GRAMA, Legislature

Salt Lake County released a stinging report this past week that describes its planning division as "beset with long-rooted dysfunction that will require significant efforts to correct."

While the Tribune summarized those findings in Wednesday's newspaper, detailing what investigators characterized as a culture ofmismanagement, readers wanted to know more. So here's the full text of the investigatory report that has led County Mayor Peter Corroon to call for reform:


Planning__Development_Services_Report.pdf


--JS

Labels: GRAMA, SLC

Be careful, BYU fans, about giving to the University of Utah marching band.

You may think you're just being a good sport, showing some state pride or supporting President-elect Barack Obama. But you may still have to answer to your fellow Cougars for what you've done.

That's because the identities of donors to colleges and universities in Utah can be public records, much like your political contributions are public records. But in the case of gifts to universities, you may request, in writing, that your name not be disclosed. At that point, the university is suppose to shield your name from disclosure.

Click here for the state statute. Read paragraph 37.

— NC

Labels: donations, GRAMA

The Utah Supreme Court just ordered the state to give some road and right-of-way documents to the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.

Hold on. I know lots of people don't like SUWA. That's OK.

This is a blog about open government. So even if you want to bulldoze, drill and slash and burn SUWA, you might take some heart in the court ruling.

You can read a PDF of that ruling here. The court affirmed two important points.*

— Documents are public unless the law specifically says otherwise.

— Just because the government does something that might get it sued does not mean documents relating to that work are exempt from disclosure under the attorney-work-product rule.

This is the supreme court's second opinion this year concerning the Utah Government Records Access and Management Act.

— NC


*I am not an attorney and frequently remind myself of that.

Labels: GRAMA, rulings

I've written before about how Utah has a superior system for appealing record denials. By one standard, Utah is ahead of its neighbors.

The National Freedom of Information Coalition published a position paper on how states can benefit by creating mediation to discuss disputes between citizens requesting records and the government agencies denying them. You can download the paper at the bottom of this post.

Utah, with its State Records Committee, is listed as a state with a mechanism for mediation or administrative appeals. It's one of the few Western states where you can fight a denial without an attorney. At least one person in Montana would like to hop aboard.

The executive director of the Montana Newspaper Association, John Barnes, suggested in a recent newsletter such an third party could prevent lawsuits and save money for taxpayers.

Despite the fact that the large majority of examples the public and media face in FOI violations require no judicial review…Montana’s open meeting and open record laws provides no other venue for relief except District Court.

And that means expense and delays so long (often a year or more) that any such value of obtaining the information has become moot.

— NC

hammitt_mediation_without_litigation.pdf

Labels: GRAMA, NFOIC

Two months after her original record request was denied, Hilarie Orman has an appeal hearing Tuesday in front of the Utah County Commission.

Orman, of the Spanish Fork News, has had a few bumps on her way to what should be a routine matter.

As I wrote in October, Orman requested reports on a trespassing case and a motorcycle crash. The Utah County Sheriff's Office denied her request, claiming the reports are protected under the law and therefore not public.

Orman appealed the decision to the Utah County Commission. It should take no more than a couple weeks to schedule an appeal hearing. Here's what happened, according to an e-mail from Orman.

I filed my appeal with the Utah County Commission in mid-October and have called about it weekly since. The county commission forwarded it to Utah County Attorney a few weeks after receiving my fax.

The county attorney's office assigned it to someone on vacation. Then Diane Orcutt, the head of the civil division... told me that she was reviewing the records and that I would hear from her soon, within a few days.

The next week her secretary said that a hearing was being scheduled and that I would hear from her "shortly". The next week I called the county commission asking if the hearing had been scheduled, and they told me it had.

I asked why I hadn't been told and what day and time were involved. They said to call Diane Orcutt. Her secretary said it was for December 9, and that I would hear this from Diane "shortly". I said that I had a business meeting in Boston that day and asked to have it postponed to December 16. They said OK, and took the message. I still have not received any formal notice of a hearing, but I plan to call them next week when I return from Boston.

After Orman's hearing, the commission can order the records released or uphold the sheriff's decision. If Orman is unsatisfied with the commission's ruling, she can appeal to the State Records Committee.

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, Police, Utah County

I spent Wednesday writing about a lawsuit filed against Ogden police officer Ken Hammond. At one point, I added this line to the article.

Shortly after the Trolley Square shootings, the city of Ogden, in answering a records request from The Tribune, said it had no records of discipline against Hammond.

That's right. While everyone else, including my own newspaper, was referring to Hammond as a "hero," I tried to find out if he had ever screwed up.

Discipline records are public records under the Utah Government Records Access and Management Act. Ogden was a little slow to respond, but eventually told me it had no records of discipline against Hammond; i.e. he had not been disciplined.

It's not that I wanted to just dig dirt on Hammond. I just wanted a more-complete picture of him.

That 1 1/2-year-old request now may be in Hammond's favor. It rebuts plaintiffs attorneys' claims there have been prior misconduct problems with Hammond.

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, Police

The University of Utah recently settled a lawsuit with Lisa Speckman, who claims she lost three limbs from a flesh-eating bacteria she contracted while under the care of university-trained medical staff.

We don't know what the university lost.





The university is refusing to disclose what it paid to Speckman to settle her lawsuit. As a taxpayer-funded institution, the University of Utah has to follow the state's records law, the Government Records Access And Management Act, which The Tribune has repeatedly used to force government agencies to disclose the terms of court settlements.

But the university is claiming a federal law takes jurisdiction here — a law governing the privacy of medical records. In denying a records request from Tribune reporter Pamela Manson, a university attorney suggested the terms of the settlement constitute are akin to releasing Speckman's medical records.

University Of Utah Associate General Counsel Brian Watts wrote to Manson:

As I am sure you appreciate, settlement of a claim that is closely connected to an individual's medical condition or treatment touches upon core personal privacy interests.

What Watts did not say in his letter is how Manson could appeal his decision. GRAMA requires agencies to include appeal options in denials.

In a follow-up e-mail, Watts suggested an appeal was not in order since a federal law is at issue. Manson disagreed and again asked Watts how to appeal. Watts later gave her the name of the university administrator who hears such appeals.

— NC

The scientific-looking photo is Strep bacteria, the root of flesh-eating bacteria, interactacting with human cells. It's courtesy of University Of California San Diego School of Medicine, via a Los Angeles Times blog. Trust me, this photo is a more-pleasant looking than a lot of flesh-eating bacteria photos.

Labels: GRAMA

You may be occupied with elections, the World Series and investigations into carbon monoxide alarms*, but there was another big story last week at the Ogden courthouse.

The Sierra Club received a favorable ruling in its open records lawsuit against the city of Ogden.

Before I start receiving e-mails from the Drill, Baby, Drill crowd, it's not that I'm rooting for the Sierra Club. The issue here is a public records case making it into a courtroom.

Utah has little case law on its public record laws, and that can lead to confusion on all sides about what documents are available to the public.

Regardless of who prevails in Sierra Club v. Ogden, the case has the potential to clarify what the government in Utah has to tell people.

— NC

*I had to give some credit to an investigation with my byline on it. Come on.

Labels: GRAMA, open records

Utah County record keepers might want to look north and find out what its big brother is doing.

The Utah County Attorney's Office has denied a request from Hilarie Orman, of the Spanish Fork News, to review two police reports. One is a report on a trespassing case. The other case is from a motorcycle crash. They're not exactly the crimes of the centuries.

Yet the attorney's office claims both reports meet the definition of a "protected" record under the Utah Government Records Access and Management Act. There are legitimate grounds for classifying a record as protected, but I can't figure out how Orman's desired reports would enter that category.*

Where police reports are concerned, GRAMA allows for the protection of ongoing cases. Both of Orman's cases are closed.

Government bodies also can protect records which, if released, would threaten someone's safety. That would have to be some trespassing case and motorcycle crash if that were the issue here.

Orman is not giving up. She has filed an appeal with the Utah County Commission in the hope it will order the sheriff's office to release the records.

The county commission can review a case decided by the State Records Committee. The committee decided police reports are public records and ordered the reports released.

— NC

* I am not an attorney and frequently remind myself of that.

Labels: GRAMA, State Records Committee

It took a while, but the Uintah Basin Standard finally figured out why the attorney general raided the local school district.

Click here to read the Standard's article. What it took to get the story highlights some deficiencies in Utah's system for disclosing search warrants:

The Standard's Geoff Liesik learned about the raid in late August, but nobody was willing to tell him what the attorney general was investigating. So Liesik went looking for the search warrant, which is suppose to say why authorities are investigating someone and what they seized.

But nobody would even tell Liesik in which court the warrant was filed. Liesik even sent a records request to the attorney general asking for the location of the warrant, but the office denied his request, saying the warrant had been sealed by a judge. The attorney general did not say which one.

But applications for secrecy orders are public records, too. But, again, Liesik did not know in which court to look for the application.

Meanwhile, this was all creating a lot of work for Liesik, who is the newspaper's only full-time news reporter.

Liesik told me he was thinking to himself: "I'm going to fight this fight and go around in circles with [the attorney general], and they're going to file charges or send out a press release saying they are not going to file charges and all this work is going to be moot."

Then a breakthrough: Nancy Volmer, the public information officer for Utah District Courts, found the secrecy application filed in 3rd District Court in Salt Lake City. The courts eventually release the application, thereby disclosing some details of the attorney general's investigation.

— NC

Labels: court records, GRAMA

Tax revenues are declining across the United States -- and that might impact whether state and local governments provide information to the people.

In Illinois, there's doubt whether the state will finance a counselor who was to help citizens fight for records.

Here in Utah, records management may take a hit at the Utah Department of Corrections. Bruce Bailey, who was director of records at the department and had a role in responding to requests from journalists and citizens, sent an e-mail Wednesday saying his position was eliminated.

In a separate e-mail, department spokeswoman Angie Welling confirmed Bailey's post is one of 35 full-time positions the department plans to eliminate. Welling added:

I can assure you that the Department remains committed to transparency and openness, and we will not allow this commitment to slide as a result of the proposed changes. We're confident that we will continue to be responsive to records requests and we will see no fundamental change in our dedication to meeting these needs.

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, jail/prisons

The Salt Lake City Mayor’s Records Appeals Board hears records cases involving that city's government. For an official agenda and information about accommodations and attending electronically, click here.

The Salt Lake City Mayor’s Records Appeals Board will hold a public meeting 10 a.m. Tuesday, Oct. 7, in Room 542 of the City & County Building, 451 S. State St.

Agenda:

Convene in open meeting for the purpose of reviewing the appeal by Roger Bryner in regards to a denial of records by the Salt Lake City Attorney’s Office.

Approx. 10:30 a.m. Meeting will adjourn to go into a closed meeting pursuant to the provision of UCA, Section 52-4-205(1) of the Open and Public Meetings Act.

Approx. 11:00 a.m. Reconvene in public meeting

Approx. 11:05 a.m. Adjourn

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, SLC

For the official agenda, information about accommodations, electronic attendance and submitting written comment, click here.

The State Records Committee will hold a meeting on 9:30 a.m. Thursday, Oct, 9. The meeting will be held in the Courtyard Meeting Room, the Archives Building, 346 South Rio Grande Street (450 West), Salt Lake City.

Committee business and three hearings have been scheduled:

* First Hearing – Jim Garside vs. Salt Lake City. Mr. Garside is appealing the denial of a copy of a joint defense agreement between Salt Lake City and Big Cottonwood Lower Canal Company.

* Second Hearing – Steve Onysko vs. Environmental Quality. Mr. Onysko is appealing the denial of documentation of communications about him and his work in the Division of Drinking Water at Environmental Quality.

* Third Hearing – Mark Haik vs. UDOT. Mr. Haik is appealing the denial of records relating to a city street map prepared by the Utah Department of Transportation in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Transportation.

* Approval of the August 14, 2008, meeting minutes of the State Records Committee

* Appeals received: A summary of cases reviewed for a hearing during the month will be presented to the Committee.

* Adjournment – Next meeting scheduled – Thursday, November 13, 2008

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, SLC, State Records Committee

The open government world is buzzing about a judgement levied against the town — And I use that word generously. — of Mesa, Wash.

Mesa, population 440, lost a long dispute with a former mayor over a records request. The state judge also imposed a $230,000 fine against the town for improperly handling the record request. That's a whopper in a records case and perhaps two-thirds of Mesa's budget, according to the Tri-City Herald.

But don't look for anyone in a black robe to make such a ruling in Utah. This state does not have a mechanism for such fines. The best you can hope for is a judge requires an agency to pay for a requester's attorney fees.

It can be a Class B misdemeanor for a government official to knowingly improperly deny a records request, but that's a big threshold and it's not clear if it can be applied to an entire agency that denies a request.

— NC

Labels: GRAMA

The Utah Department of Corrections and some county jails did not come off well in a legislative audit released today. Among other things, the department did a poor job overseeing county jails where it keeps inmates, the audit says.

Meanwhile, journalists and the public aren't allowed to oversee much of what Corrections or the jails are doing. Earlier this year, Corrections denied a records request I made for inspection reports of county jails.

The State Records Committee sided with Corrections. The committee agreed a state statute preventing the release of "security measures" applied to the inspection reports. The theory is an inmate could use the information in the inspection to plot an escape. That the public should be informed of dangers at a jail is not to be considered, Corrections and the committee decided.

And while today's audit recommended improving the jail inspection process and documentation, Correction's non-disclosure policy and the records committee's ruling stands. So Utah could have the best and safest penitentiaries and jails in the world — or the worst — and we aren't allowed to know.

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, jail/prisons, secrecy, State Records Committee

Goodness gracious. No wonder we have such a hard time getting information from the government. Not only do government officials not know the law, apparently neither do some of my colleagues.

Take an article in Friday's Standard-Examiner about the Davis County Library Board clarifying its privacy policies on lending. The first sentence reads:

Library reading and information records are as private as medical records.

Uh, no. There is no federal regulation of public library records. In Utah, library records can be classified as private and in some circumstances the release of private information can be considered a misdemeanor offense. I have not seen such a prosecution in my three-plus years reporting on Utah crime.

Medical records are safeguarded by state and federal law. Any health provider who violates the rules face the real possibility of fines from the federal government. Plus the provider is vulnerable to lawsuits from the victim. On the whole, there are a lot more teeth in protections for medical records.

So the deputy county attorney who gave the briefing was wrong when he said:

...the law is no different than the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, known as HIPPA.

No G-Man will knock on your door if you tell people I once checked out a Danielle Steel novel, guys.

Here's one that really blew me away and I wish the reporter had challenged. The deputy county attorney said the move to keep private the library records are "important because it protects a person's First Amendment rights...."

What? I make my living off the First Amendment and I have never heard it applied to secretly checking out Kama Sutra from the library. Some courts have cited the First Amendment to prevent banning books from libraries, but if you want a constitutional right to check out in privacy, I suggest looking farther down the Bill of Rights.

-- nc

Labels: GRAMA, secrecy

In my first post for this blog, I wrote about how Utah has a good system for appealing record denials. But the system is not perfect, and you can blame it on the lawyers.

Well, kind of. Here's why.

Reporter Steve Gehrke requested some documents from the Salt Lake County Attorney's Office. Last week, he received a denial and instructions on how to appeal that denial to the Salt Lake County Council. The council will schedule an appeal hearing before it. Here's the catch.

Salt Lake County Attorney Lohra Miller is the council's lawyer. For Gehrke to win his appeal, he must persuade the council its attorney is wrong; that the council should ignore its lawyer's advice and give him the documents.

Of course, we think the county attorney is wrong, but why should the council listen to us non-lawyers when it finances people with juris doctorates? And there's no requirement for the council to seek an outside legal opinion. (If the council rejects our appeal, we could take it to the State Records Committee but that means more time and effort.)

This structural flaw in the appeal process is not unique to Salt Lake County. I had an almost identical scenario last year when I tried to obtain records from the Utah County Attorney. A similar problem exists when the state of Utah denies a records request. The Utah attorney general will represent the state in an appeal. The attorney general also is the lawyer for the State Records Committee.

But maybe the Salt Lake County Council will surprise us and decide it's getting bad legal advice. Stay tuned.

--nc

The photograph is the great Phil Hartman as the Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer.

Labels: GRAMA, State Records Committee

Monday was rough for public disclosure in Utah.

First, a judge excluded reporters from a court hearing discussing a buyout involving Usana Health Sciences Inc. (Maybe there's something in the water at Utah courthouses.)

Then we heard about a lawsuit filed by the city of Murray. The city does not want to disclose the names of disciplined police officer, even though there is a state statute specifically saying it must.

63G-2-301. Records that must be disclosed...
...(o) records that would disclose information relating to formal charges or disciplinary actions against a past or present governmental entity employee if:
(i) the disciplinary action has been completed and all time periods for administrative appeal have expired; and
...(ii) the charges on which the disciplinary action was based were sustained;

This strategy sure worked great for Sandy.

-- nc

Labels: GRAMA, Sandy, secrecy

The link from Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff's page to Utah's Government Records Access and Management law is dead.

Shurtleff, you might recall, has in the past made a big deal out of promoting GRAMA, so we assume he's watching this blog closely and the link will be up and running soon.

-mdl

Labels: GRAMA

Twice this week, Tribune justice reporters had problems obtaining the most basic information about a victim: a name.

These weren't any victims. They were children. The respective police agencies thought that meant they should not just give out the information.

In the first case, a 17-year-old girl died in an ATV crash in Sanpete County. The sheriff's office declined to release her name and suggested we watch the obituaries. A central Utah radio station reported the name and I confirmed it with a telephone call to the teenager's family.


The second case was a 17-month-old girl who drowned in Sugar House Park. Salt Lake City police declined to give us the girl's name over the telephone, as they do most adult victims, and suggested we file an open-records request. I then spoke with an attorney for the city who told me I should file a record request when it's suggested I do so, but read me the name in this instance.


Government agencies are reluctant to discuss children, and I understand why. It's human nature to protect kids. Lawmakers in Utah and most states have codified the instinct by closing to the public documents in child welfare matters and some juvenile court cases. News outlets are protective, too. The Tribune typically does not name child victims or even criminal suspects who are children as the newspaper would adults.

But it's a different matter when a child dies. Utah law does not require a dead child name's be kept secret. Neither does federal law.

In 2006, the National Park Service refused to release the names of child drowning victims on Lake Powell. The Tribune made administrative appeals and it resulted in the Park Service making agency-wide regulations requiring name disclosure.


************************

And now some easy news

A few weeks ago, I wrote the city governments of Salt Lake City, Ogden, Logan, Orem, Provo, Cedar City and St. George and asked for any audits, conducted within the last two years, on their respective fire and police departments.

The requests were answered on time with the cities providing me the documents or telling me where I could find them. Yeah, so I didn't exactly ask for the Pentagon Papers, but with that many towns, I figured there would be one holdout and there was not.

-- nc

Labels: FOIA, GRAMA, secrecy, SLC

Late at night, my mother calls. She has that tone in her voice that means something is wrong.

“Grandpa fell down and is at the hospital," she tells me. "The doctors tell us we have to put him in a nursing home. But, Matt, how do I pick? How do I know what place will really take care of him?”

She called me because I’m a reporter and I'm used to rooting out information. I tried everything I could think of to help, but found little to go on. In the end, my family placed my grandfather at Christus St. Joesph Villa, where he lives today, simply because he would be close to relatives.

The urgency and fear in my mother’s voice stuck with me, especially because I knew that so many families go through the same thing all the time. When my bosses asked me to write about aging from a state government perspective, I knew exactly what story I wanted to start with.

The premise: What information is out there to help people differentiate between good nursing homes and bad ones?

I zeroed in on government inspections, which are regulated federally but handled locally -- and which are clearly public records under the law.

The Tribune embarked on this project in November of 2006. The stories will finally appear in the paper this weekend.

The series got delayed by all kinds of things, including the state Legislature, elections and my move from Salt Lake City to The Tribune’s Washington, D.C. bureau -- but the biggest hold up was prying the records from the Utah Department of Health.

It took almost four months to get the first batch of data after The Tribune made its original request. No one disputed the information was public, but the health department had no easy internal mechanism to hand over the reports.

Although this is incredibly valuable information for those who are looking into placing their loved ones into a nursing home, the reports are not available online, nor in a file where they can easily be e-mailed, burned on a CD or even printed out. Rather, the reports are contained in a government database that resembles microfiche. A state employee had to go page by page to make sure he handed over only public data, not personal medical information.

The process was time consuming and costly and since they were not excited about doing it, the health department stalled at first. It took a few months, but the staff eventually warmed up and became more helpful.

What is a total challenge in Utah is a piece of cake in other states. Arizona has a really simple site that allows people to not only compare the last three inspection reports, but also click on individual violations to get more info.

Utah officials say they don’t have the resources to make such an easy-to-use site. So The Tribune has come up with its own database, and while it doesn’t include every report, it does include the most serious ones.

Here's what we're hoping: If you ever get that same panicked call that I got, you'll have a place to go to help you make one of the most important decisions of your life.

Labels: GRAMA, Utah Department of Health

I'm typing this on Wednesday night, just after I filed the article about the latest batch of documents from the Trolley Square shootings. Here's the background on how we acquired the reports and photographs.

In January, the Salt Lake City police department released its final report on the shootings. We here at The Tribune wanted the source material for that report and figured since the shootings were officially a closed case, we could have access under GRAMA. On Jan. 17, I filed a GRAMA request with the police department.

My request is summarized below... in the police department's denial letter. You'll see the department had arguments for why the documents should be kept out of public view.

I respectfully disagreed and filed a letter of appeal found below. On March 27, the Salt Lake City Corp. appeals board heard my case. I was accompanied by Tribune justice editor Elizabeth Neff while the police department was represented by an attorney as well as two police detectives who offered explanations for why the documents should be withheld.

My specific legal arguments aside, The Tribune's philosophical argument went like this: The police department's final report only tells us what it thought was important or wanted to say. We want our own access to the information about Sulejman Talovic, his victims and the killings.

The police department and the city's philosophical argument was essentially: We have provided information to the public about Trolley Square. Releasing additional information can expose our investigative techniques and cause more emotional harm to everyone involved.

The appeal board's ruling found agreements and disagreements with all the arguments and reasons to release some records and not others.

This hasn't been the first disagreement over records related to the Trolley Square shootings. The parents of slain victim Vanessa Quinn have gone to federal appeals court trying to obtain a report from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

This may not be the last time The Tribune asks for records related to the shooting either. There are still things we want to know about the shootings. We don't know if anyone has that information, but we're not ready to stop looking.


TrolleyGRAMAappealSLC.pdf

hppscan53.pdf


-- nc

Labels: GRAMA, SLC

One attorney wonders whether the State Records Committee is paying attention to the recent decision discussed below.

This spring, the Deseret News won a records case that went all the way to the Utah Supreme Court. The court ordered Salt Lake County to release a report on a sexual harassment investigation. Then on May 8, a former Utah Department of Corrections employee, represented by attorney Chad Steur, took a similar case to the State Records Committee.

Steur's client wanted sexual harassment investigation reports on two other corrections workers, one of whom was found by the department to have harassed. Steur used the News ruling to argue releasing the reports on both workers.

The records committee sided with Steur on the report for the worker found to have harassed and ordered the report released. But the committee allowed corrections to keep secret the report for the guy who was absolved of harassment. The committee said releasing that report would "constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of privacy." Here is a link to the complete order.

The split decision eats at Steur. He says the News ruling should have applied to both reports and says the records committee made an arbitrary decision.

"It remains to be seen whether the records committee is going to follow the mandate from the Utah Supreme Court that all records are public," Steur told me in an interview.

Steur said his client wanted to judge for herself whether both harassment cases were handled properly but cannot without the reports.

-- nc

Labels: GRAMA, State Records Committee

Sometimes records requests prompt articles. Sometimes articles prompt records requests. And so on and so on.

That's the story behind our recent exposé about a secret compensation system that has netted tens of thousands of dollars in extra pay for Sandy city's top executives. The story was prompted by a review of pay records obtained by The Tribune via a Government Records Access and Management Act request (and several years of further legal wrangling.) The article then prompted discussions that led to a new revelation: In the waning days of the court case, the city hired outside legal help - in addition to the legal services of its own staff of attorneys - to try to fight a court order to pay the Tribune's legal fees.

That prompted a new GRAMA request. And the city promptly turned over records showing more than $14,000 in payments to a downtown Salt Lake City law firm - and about $700 to the public policy expert whom Sandy officials have said advised the city not to release the records.

You can review those records, which include a detailed account of how the lawyers spent their $200-plus-an-hour time, here, here, here, here and here.

-- mdl

Labels: GRAMA, Sandy

The Tribune's Rosemary Winters reports that Sandy City Councilors will "take a closer look" at the city's bonus program, focusing in particular on why so much or the money goes to so few people at the top of the pay scale on such a regular basis.

But it doesn't appear the council is rushing to the human resources office to start sorting through the pay stubs. At Tuesday night's council meeting, Winters reports, it took four hours "to bring up the elephant in the chamber."

This week, The Tribune published details of the bonus program after winning a four-year legal fight with Sandy to have the public records disclosed. The council plans to discuss the budget -- including the issue of compensation -- during meetings the next few weeks and at a public hearing May 20.

-mdl

Labels: GRAMA, Sandy

Several members of the Sandy City Council are demanding a review of the city's bonus system following The Tribune's Sunday report that senior executives were reaping rich and repetitive rewards under the program.

Under the direction of Sandy's top brass, the city's attorneys spent tens of thousands of dollars fighting a legal battle to keep the program secret, much to the dismay of community activist Robyn Bagley.

"It disturbs me that Sandy fought for so long," she said. "These are government salaries that are funded by taxpayers. Transparency is critical."

Meanwhile, Tricia Beck, a longtime Mayor Dolan critic and political opponent, told KSL-TV the recently-exposed bonus program "is an example of greed, arrogance and entitlement."

KSL also hosted a conversation on the issue as part of its "Talking Point" segment on Monday evening.

-mdl

Labels: GRAMA, Sandy

This blog probably will write a lot about the problems with Utah's records and meeting laws. So my first post is about something Utah does well: You don't have to settle for a no.

Or at least not right away. Utah provides an appeals process far superior to any state I've found. If you request a record from a Utah agency -- such as a city, a county or a state agency -- and that agency denies you, the agency then must provide you an appeal option. Some agencies, such as Salt Lake City government, have entire boards to hear your appeal while other agencies allow you to appeal to an administrator.

If that board or administrator rules against your appeal, you're still not done. You have the option of appealing to the State Records Committee. If you lose at that committee, you have one more option: you can sue in state court. (A similar appeals process exists for the agency which received the request if the agency thinks your documents should not be disclosed.)

I worked in Missouri for three years and if an agency there denies your request, your only option is to sue. Lawsuits are expensive even if you win. Government agencies know that and it gives them an incentive to deny your request.

In November, The Tribune published an investigation on college drug testing that used record requests in 39 states. Among the schools who denied my request, only the University of Nebraska told me I had an administrative appeal option. (I did not pursue it.)

What makes an administrative appeal option so good for us citizens? Well, it's one thing for an agency to deny a record request. It's another thing for the agency to stand in public and justify the denial. Utah's appeals process keeps a lot of records cases out of court and gives a fighting chance to the little guys.

— NC

Labels: GRAMA, SLC, State Records Committee

On Feb. 6, 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune published "Payday Blues" -- an extensive look into the disparities in pay between public safety officers throughout Salt Lake County. The article was the result of a months-long effort, using Utah's Government Records Access and Management Act (GRAMA) to obtain personnel records from each city and the county government.

Recognizing that GRAMA denotes certain information as "records that must be disclosed," most of the queried agencies promptly complied with the newspaper's requests for the names, genders and compensation of their public safety officers.

But there was one city that gave us a tougher fight. Officials from Sandy refused to turn over the names of police officers and firefighters, arguing in part that disclosure of the identities of these officers might impair investigations or place the officers' safety in jeopardy. Among other arguments, they cited the kidnappings and murders of Iraqi police officers as evidence that it was bad policy to reveal the identities of public safety officials.

The Utah State Records Committee, which seeks to resolve public records disputes, disagreed with Sandy and ordered the city to turn over the information.

The city initially declined to provide segregated base pay, arguing that the committee's order and state law only required it to provide the sum total of all forms of renumeration given to each employee. Eventually, the city relented on the issue of salary, but continued to decline to provide segregated figures for benefits, overtime, bonuses, incentives and other forms of pay.

The city's response did give us enough information to work with in order to produce the Payday Blues article -- which revealed, among other things, that "with morale plummeting, many Sandy police officers and firefighters, who are among the lowest paid in Salt Lake County, are quietly seeking jobs elsewhere." Meanwhile, the article continued, "Sandy's top administrators are among the best paid in the county."

The article caused quite a stir -- and letters and phone calls we received from Sandy employees following the publication of that story steeled us to continue the fight for the other forms of compensation, particularly as several of the e-mails hinted of chronyism in the city's extensive bonus program.

"I'm sure the administrators are getting nearly all of the bonus money," wrote one employee. "I've heard rumors that the chief receives up to $10,000," added another.

Back before the State Records Committee, the newspaper won another order for Sandy to turn over the its bonus and overtime information.

But this time, the city sued to keep the information from the public eye, sparking a three-year legal battle which resulted in a judge's order for Sandy to disclose the information — and to pay the newspaper's legal fees of more than $30,000. That order, and other documents from the 3rd District Court case, can be found here and here.

Last month, The Tribune began analyzing those records. The resulting article, online now and to be published in print in Sunday's Tribune, reveals a bonus program that disproportionately rewards top administrators from all city departments -- and even provides Sandy Mayor Tom Dolan with a $1,000+ "thank you" bonus, each year.

Dolan's check pales in comparison to those received by city administrator Byron Jorgenson and 11 other city leaders who help administer the program, each of whom picks up the equivalent of about a month's salary in bonuses, year after year.

Meanwhile, most city employees who do get bonuses get the equivalent of a few day's pay. And hundreds get nothing at all.

In the wake of the Payday Blues article, Sandy's police officers and firefighters were given substantial raises. Recent interviews with officers indicates that morale appears to have improved and the rapid emigration of officers to other, better-paying municipalities has slowed.

What will be the result of our article about Sandy's secret bonus program? We'll be watching closely.

- mdl/mc

Labels: GRAMA, Sandy