Archives for March 2006

From the Associated Press

BOISE, Idaho (AP) – A District Court judge ruled Friday that members of the Ada County Commission violated the Idaho Open Meeting Law when they gathered behind closed doors last June 15 to discuss a proposed new housing development.

No fines have yet been levied against Judy Peavey-Derr, Rick Yzaguirre and Fred Tilman in the lawsuit filed against the commission by the Idaho attorney general’s office.

Both sides can submit suggestions on “the amount of monetary sanction which should be imposed,” Judge William Woodward wrote in a 10-page ruling. Each of the commissioners faces a penalty of $150, the maximum allowed by Idaho law for first-time Open Meeting Law violations.

The commissioners met with Boise City Councilman Vern Bisterfeldt to discuss a proposed 1,000-home, 700-acre development atop a plateau above the Boise River east of Idaho’s capital city. The project has spawned opposition among opponents who say building there could damage wildlife.

The Open Meeting Law allows governmental bodies to hold closed sessions “to consider and advise its legal representatives in pending litigation or where there is general public awareness of probable litigation.”

No lawyer was present at the commission’s closed meeting.

Woodland wrote that the defendants lacked the authority to hold a closed meeting.

Phone calls to Rich Wright, the county commission’s spokesman, to determine how much money the panel has spent on private attorney Patrick Furey to defend them in the case weren’t immediately returned.

From the Associated Press

Editorial from The Times-News

Look it up, read it, and then read it again. The Idaho Constitution demands that our elected leaders operate in broad daylight, with open doors, and in a public venue.

So reads Article 3, Section 12: “The business of each house, and of the committee of the whole shall be transacted openly and not in secret session.”

Apparently, the Idaho Supreme Court disagrees.

In a 3-2 decision released Monday that could have lasting impact on state government, the court ruled the Idaho Constitution doesn’t require legislators to open committee meetings to the public.

The decision came from a case involving the Idaho Press Club which objected to closed committee meetings in the 2003 and 2004 Legislatures. The Press Club and the Legislature agreed to seek the court’s opinion on those closed meetings.

Justice Daniel Eismann described how Section 12 splits hairs between “each house,” the “committee of the whole,” and the legislative committee. The latter is the smaller committee that oversees specific areas of legislation and state issues.

Anyone who observes the Legislature knows committees determine the shape and outcome of legislation in state government. As proof, look no further than the slate of legislation that centered on coal-fired plants. Committee debate determine if they lived or died. And remember, only in committees can the public testify on legislation.

But because the framers of Idaho’s Constitution did not include specific language limiting those committees, the court said the Constitution exempts them from the openness requirement. The majority opinion followed a rationale saying when a law lists some things for regulation, then it excludes all others.

“When the framers drafted a provision expressly limiting certain powers, there is no reason to believe that they intended the limitation to be broader than they drafted it,” Eismann wrote.

That explanation still doesn’t jive with the rest of the opinion. Eismann noted instances from the state constitutional convention where delegates specifically voted against giving the Legislature broad powers to close meetings.

In his dissenting opinion, Justice Jim Jones (joined by Justice Roger Burdick) repeatedly pointed out instances where the framers expressly objected to closed proceedings.

Jones added, “I find the Legislature’s argument that it may under the Constitution close committee meetings a bit disingenuous, in light of Idaho Code Section 67-2346: ‘All meetings of any standing, special, or select committee of either house of the legislature of the state of Idaho shall be open to the public at all times.'”

Long before the court made its decision, Idaho legislators agreed to drafting new rules that would curb their ability to close committee meetings. House Speaker Bruce Newcomb, R-Burley, discourages closed meetings with the exception of caucuses and litigious matters.

But Newcomb is on his way out, and tightened rules for these meetings can be undone at any time by future legislators — a fact enlightened further in Jones’ dissenting opinion.

“If legislative committee work is shielded from public view, what is there to keep either house from conducting even more of its legislative work in committee, including perhaps the final debate, leaving only the final vote to occur in open session? This is not a wise road upon which to embark.”

If that sounds frightening for democracy, it is. Unfortunately, this court opinion gives future legislators the chance to make it happen.

Editorial from The Times-News

Our view: Lawmaking should be done in plain sight

Editorial from The Spokesman-Review

By a one-vote margin, Idaho Supreme Court justices decided this week that legislators can conduct committee meetings in secret.

The majority in the 3-2 decision penned by Justice Daniel Eismann against the Idaho Press Club focused on the fact that committee meetings weren’t addressed by the drafters of the Idaho Constitution when they insisted that lawmakers conduct public business openly. So, Justices Eismann, Linda Copple Trout and Gerald Schroeder ruled that the constitutional demand for openness applied only to full meetings of the House and Senate, not committees.

In handing down the disappointing decree, Eismann, Copple and Schroeder resembled the biblical Pharisees who were mesmerized by the letter of the law but failed to understand its intent. That the Idaho Constitution intended that the business of the Idaho Senate and the Idaho House “be transacted openly and not in secret session” is without dispute. That the Legislature has farmed out much of the business of the two houses to their committees is without dispute, too. That 21st-century Idahoans desire that public business be conducted in full view has been supported by several polls.

At this point, supermajority Republican lawmakers can proceed in one of two directions. They can view the split court decision as a license to close meetings to avoid controversy or other uncomfortable situations. Or they can act responsibly and close meetings only when dealing with extreme situations, such as litigation or state security, realizing that two justices dissented in the case and that their constituents disdain secret meetings. Those who show contempt for open government by abusing this carte blanche authority to close committee meetings should be defeated at the polls.

In his excellent dissent, Justice Jim Jones explained why it is important to keep all committee meetings open:

“… Bills are formulated in committees, competing proposals are considered, amendments are made, public policy is formulated, and the people are entitled to participate. They have a limited ability to do so when the Legislature debates and votes in full session. If legislative committee work is shielded from public view, what is there to keep either house from conducting even more of its legislative work in committee, including perhaps the final debate, leaving only the final vote to occur in open session? This is not a wise road upon which to embark.”

Justice Roger Burdick joined Jones in the dissent.

All is not lost for those who understand the importance of public access. Idaho lawmakers may have a slim majority of Supreme Court justices on their side, but they don’t have their constituents in their corner. They should be held accountable each time they meet behind closed doors. Last year, the Senate voted 26-9 to close committee meetings for any reason, with four North Idaho Republicans supporting the action: Joyce Broadsword of Sagle, Mike Jorgenson of Hayden Lake, and John Goedde and Dick Compton, both of Coeur d’Alene. Only Republican Sen. Shawn Keough of Sandpoint opposed the move.

Compton isn’t running again, but North Idahoans should remember this vote when the other three senators campaign this spring.

Editorial from The Spokesman-Review

Editorial from The Idaho Statesman

On Monday, legislative committees took up issues as varied and vital as school construction, pesticide safety, high school curriculum and elected officials’ salaries.

And on Monday, a divided Idaho Supreme Court missed an opportunity to stand up for your right to attend these meetings.

The court ruled 3-2 that the Idaho Constitution does not require legislators to keep committee meetings open. That decision essentially defends the status quo — House and Senate operating rules that allow a committee to close any meeting, for any reason, on a two-thirds vote.

It’s too bad Chief Justice Gerald Schroeder, Justice Dan Eismann and Justice Linda Copple Trout weren’t swayed by their colleagues, Justices Jim Jones and Roger Burdick. Jones’ dissenting opinion presented a powerful case for the importance of open committees:

• Committees — which debate and refine bills and accept public testimony — clearly conduct legislative business. As the state’s Constitution says, “The business of each house, and of the committee of the whole shall be transacted openly and not in secret session.”

• In a state Constitution where all political power is inherent in the people, the people maintain the right to instruct their elected officials. “There is no indication in the Constitution that the people intended their right to instruct to stop at the doors of a closed committee meeting,” Jones wrote.

• Committee meetings allow Idahoans to watch the formation of policy, not just the final vote on bills. If committees are allowed to do some of their work outside public view, Jones asked, what’s to stop a committee from debating bills in secret and emerging only to cast their final votes? “This is not a wise road on which to embark.”

Secrecy can become troubling in a hurry. That’s why the Idaho Press Club, a statewide media organization, sued the Legislature in 2004, after lawmakers closed seven meetings in 2003 and 2004. Press Club members wanted to stop closed meetings and force the Legislature to conduct public business in public view.

The court majority took no side on that issue, ruling only on whether the language of the Constitution requires open meetings. Eismann’s opinion focused on Idaho’s constitutional convention of 1889, trying to discern what the founding fathers meant when they advocated conducting legislative business in the open.

Interpreting 117-year-old deliberations is one thing. Interpreting the current will of the people, in this case, is easy.

Seventy-five percent of Idahoans said the Legislature should conduct its business in the open, according to a Boise State University survey released in January 2005. Later in 2005, the nonpartisan group The Common Interest found even more overwhelming opposition to secrecy; the group polled a sampling of its more than 700 members, and 95 percent opposed the House and Senate rules allowing closed meetings.

Since the Supreme Court didn’t rule on whether meetings should be open, that decision belongs to lawmakers. They have ample reason to replace current rules that invite secrecy with rules that preserve openness.

Editorial from The Idaho Statesman

In Idaho and across the country, sunshine laws keep government at all levels open to public scrutiny and accountable to taxpayers.

This April, join hundreds of people who will share critical information trends occurring across the country-from local communities to the halls of the White House. First Amendment lawyers, journalists, state coalitions, and citizen advocates will come together for an unprecedented 2006 Freedom of Information Summit at the downtown Indianapolis Radisson.

The National Freedom of Information Coalition and the Indiana Coalition for Open Government invite you to hear first-hand from scores of experts during a two-day conference scheduled Friday, April 21-Saturday, April 22, 2006. The summit’s award-winning speakers have detailed this nation’s natural disasters, exposed national and international wrongdoing, researched legislative trends on privatization and helped organized nonprofit advocacy groups.

A discounted registration rate of $100 per person is available only through Tuesday, March 28, and offered exclusively with online registration. Individual event tickets are also being sold, ranging from $35 to $60.

For more information, visit www.indianacog.org

From the Associated Press

By CHRISTOPHER SMITH
Associated Press Writer

BOISE, Idaho (AP) – The Idaho Legislature followed a national trend toward increasing secrecy of government records over the past five years, passing twice as many laws restricting release of information as measures that increased access to documents, according to an Associated Press analysis.

Of the 60 bills affecting public records disclosure that were proposed by state lawmakers from 2001 through 2005, 33 passed. Of those, 22 created new or additional laws limiting the public’s ability to view records created by state or local governments and 11 created more openness in government records or meetings.

Only one of the new Idaho laws was in direct response to the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, an event generally considered to be the starting point of a period of increased secrecy in government activities. Most of the other measures restricting access to Idaho public records were driven by an increased desire to protect privacy by restricting release of information on individuals that had been available in the public domain.

Those new privacy laws included classifying as confidential information on crime victims receiving compensation, some sex offender records, and basic information on voter registration cards, such as addresses and phone numbers.

That shift also reflected tendencies nationally.

“After 9/11, people were taking all sorts of government records off the Web and trying to close off public records, but that has died off over the past few years,” says David Cuillier, who teaches media law and public affairs reporting at the University of Idaho and who recently conducted a national survey on public records secrecy for Access Northwest, a nonpartisan research group at Washington State University’s Murrow School of Communication.

“Privacy invasion has been an increasing issue in citizens’ minds and probably legislators’ minds, even though the federal data on identity theft shows the crime doesn’t typically start with taking information from public records, it begins with a stolen wallet or mail.”

The Access Northwest survey completed March 4 asked 403 randomly selected adults from across the country questions on their attitudes toward openness in government and public records. Eight in 10 said democracy requires government to operate in the open and two-thirds said openness keeps government officials honest. Most respondents said the press should have access to several types of public records, from property tax rolls and elected officials’ expense accounts and e-mail to police reports and public utility records.

But in matters of homeland security, Cuillier said people he surveyed supported government curbs on press access to records that potentially could be used by terrorists.

“My study showed while people strongly support the idea of open government, the majority think it’s OK for government to close records if it’s going to protect us from terrorism,” he said. “A majority said we should leave it up to the government to decide what to leave open and what not to leave open.”

The pros and cons of that sentiment played out in the Idaho Legislature in the 2002 session that began three months after the Sept. 11 attacks. Then-Idaho Attorney General Al Lance asked lawmakers to approve a package of “anti-terrorism” bills, including one that would have let judges shut down any public record if state agencies argued the release of the information could threaten public or individual safety.

“There was a huge hysteria after 9/11 about how the terrorists were coming to get us and there was this rush to close everything down,” said Debora Kristensen, a Boise attorney who lobbied for the Idaho Press Club in the 2002 session. “The Press Club was saying no, no, no, this was bad policy, but there was a strong sentiment in favor of closing off all kinds of information.”

The measure passed the House but it was killed on a 6-3 vote in a Senate committee after some lawmakers questioned the need for such an open-ended opportunity for state agencies to close records. In its place, a compromise bill was adopted that prevents disclosure of documents related to public agency buildings or operational plans “when the disclosure of such information would jeopardize the safety of persons or the public safety.”

“The first attempt was so overly broad as to preclude release of anything,” said Roy Eiguren, a Boise attorney who represented the Allied Daily Newspapers in the 2002 Legislature. “After that was blocked in committee we were able to work with the attorney general to come up with something that wasn’t so all-encompassing.”

The battle between the Idaho press and lawmakers over open records in 2002 has since morphed into a fight over open meetings. In 2003, Republican majority lawmakers held six meetings of standing legislative committees in secret, claiming security issues and the Legislature’s inherent right to close a committee meeting to the public at any time.

The Idaho Press Club sued, arguing that the state constitution specifies the Legislature’s business must be conducted “openly, and not in secret session.”

In 2004, a state judge determined framers of the Idaho Constitution intended only the general floor sessions of the House and Senate should always be open, not the committee hearings. The media has appealed to the Idaho Supreme Court, which has yet to rule.

Cuillier said the tussles between press and politicians over access reflects a public interest in open democracy.

“If the public doesn’t support these ideas, there’s nothing stopping government from making everything secret,” he said.

From the Associated Press
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On the Net:
Idaho Press Club: https://www.idahopressclub.org/
Access Northwest: https://www.wsu.edu/~accessnw/index.html