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June 2010
California's Public Records Act - Its the Loopholes Stupid!
Posted by CotoBlogzz 05-27-2010 09:30 PM
Rancho Santa Margarita, CA - California government code section 6250 was enacted because the legislature recognized that access to information concerning the conduct of government employees is a fundamental and necessary right of every person in this state. The legislature in an effort to discourage the Madoff Syndrome, further declares that information means any handwriting, typewriting, printing, photostating, photographing, photocopying, transmitting by electronic mail or facsimile, and every other means of recording upon any tangible thing any form of communication or representation, including letters, words, pictures, sounds, or symbols, or combinations thereof, and any record thereby created, regardless of the manner in which the record has been stored.
So, how did Madoff get way without leaving a trail? He simply advised his cohorts not to write and or record anything. Eerily, as we continue to look at parasitic bureaucracies, we find some parallels:
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California
Law Revision Commission
The
California Law Revision Commission’s (CLRC)
Executive Director Brian Hebert allegedly contacted a
book publisher, to drop a book authored by a dogged
critic. The book just happens to be a must read for
residents fighting abusive common interest
development/Homeowners association (CID/HOA) boards
and for taxpayers fed up with the bloated California
bureaucracy. We understand that as a result of the
CLRC's actions, a lawsuit may be filed. Mr. Hebert
refused to comment, stating that the CLRC does not
comment on pending litigation matters.
We tried to determine the level of the CLRC’s
involvement in the book matter studying phone record
and expense reimbursement for CLRC staff for the
period in question. We found there was a six-month
black hole – a period where telephone records were
missing. Mr. Hebert attributed the missing documents
to a “service provider failure." In this case a
telephone system failure. When questioned further as
to what the CLRC was prepared to do to make sure the
agency would be responsive to future freedom of
information act requests, Mr. Hebert reasoned that his
agency was not big enough and had to outsource its
telephone needs. The implications are not
inconsequential when it comes to transparency and
accountability: Any government entity can avoid being
subjected to freedom of information act requests, by
merely outsourcing its communication needs for
example.
“UOP ordinarily keeps records of all long distance
calls, as an integrated part of their telephone
service system. Unfortunately, their system
malfunctioned, and stopped recording long distance
call details during the period you've described. That
error affected all of the phone lines at the McGeorge
School of Law in Sacramento, including the lines
assigned to the Law Revision Commission. As a result
of that error, UOP has no long distance phone records
for McGeorge for that time period. Consequently, long
distance call information for that period was never
provided to my agency, despite my requests that it be
provided. To my knowledge, the information does not
exist,” said
Mr. Hebert. That is, all that a parasitic bureaucracy needs to do to
outskirt the California legislature is to outsource
its facility needs.
Orange
County Sheriffs Department
In pursuing a piece we call FileGate in Laguna Woods, we filed a Public Records Request with the Sheriff on February 5, 2009, and although it took the department until February 17, 2009 to deny they had any records, a Laguna Woods resident did get a response directly from the responsible Lieutenant. saying “the incident was documented in an Information Report, not a Crime Report. You were not listed as a suspect of a crime.” – which means that the FileGate was not robbery or burglary as initially listed by the Homeowners association with the helped the of the OCSD investor - one of the FileGate outstanding questions. In other words, the OCSD was not responsive to the PRA request: Messages left in the OCSD’s voice mail and or email does not show up.
California
Department of Fish and Game
The
Coto de Caza local governance in its infinite wisdom,
with reserves at less than 30% (when they should be at
70%), not only continues to subsidize no-residents at
the tune of $3 million per year, but continue to waste
money pursuing annexation by the City of Rancho Santa
Margarita. Since
the city cannot see a compelling argument for
annexation, the local governance continues to waste
money left and right.
The latest is building a Dog Park – the idea
was apparently discussed in closed session (statute is
very clear as to which topics can and cannot be
discussed in closed session), including being in
violation of California Department of Fish and Game.
As we investigated claims that the Department
of Fish an Game had filed a complaint with the Orange
County District Attorney, we are told by a Department
of Fish and Game representative
that if the issue is classified as “under
investigation”, then the department is not obligated
to release any information.
As we pressed, it was clear that all a
parasitic bureaucrat needs to do to skirt the
California legislature is to label the information as
“under investigation” and that department will not
release any relevant information.
Orange
County Transportation Authority
In large part because of our efforts, a reported on the accident suffered by Coto de Caza resident Patti Pattison while was driving South on the 241 Toll Road, the California Highway Patrol (CHP) was able to crack the case. Not thanks to the TCA and or the Toll Roads – while the department never responded to our PRA request, eventually it cooperated with the CHP investigator.
We have been asking lawmakers to look at California’s Triple Threat- that should include looking at the current loopholes being used by parasitic bureaucracies to skirt the spirit and the law of the Private Records Act
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