passopenrecords.org

Well, open records is certainly and suddenly getting people’s attention. Here is a sampling of some commentary by bloggers and editorial writers from around the state. Visit the sites below for the full stories. And send in your own.

A couple from Brett Lieberman’s “Pennsyltucky Politics Blog” on the site of the Harrisburg Patriot-News

• File this one in the Department of the Obvious.
Penn State, which has been fighting to keep Joe Paterno’s salary secret and has always bristled at the prying eyes of lawmakers, the public or newspapers, wants an extra special exclusion in the new open-records law the legislators are considering.”I don’t know what’s out there that needs to be known that’s in the best interest of the commonwealth to be known by including us in the legislation [sic],” Penn State President Graham Spanier told the Senate State Government Committee Monday.

Fortunately, state Sen. Jeff Piccola, R-Dauphin County, was ready to step up with the obvious answer that somehow seems to have eluded Spanier.

“Large sums of public money do go to your respective institutions, and the public views it as their own, rightly or wrongly,” said Piccola, chairman of the committee.

• You might not know as much as you’d like to know under proposals to change Pennsyltucky’s Right-to-Know Law.
Though there was a lot of hype, from legislative leaders to Gov. Ed Rendell about proposals to make state and local government information more easily accessible, prospects aren’t quite what they used to be despite 30 Senate co-sponsors, reports Mark Scolforo of The Associated Press.

Instead, some legislators are saying whoa, let’s slow this train down a bit.

“If we think we’re going to come up with the bill in the next weeks or months that’s going to solve everything, I think we’re naive,” said Rep. Kerry A. Benninghoff, R-Centre. ”I also believe it would be better to be a little more cautious and expand as times goes on.”

• And from the blogger, Veblen, an annotated version of Penn State President Graham Spanier’s testimony at Monday morning’s Senate hearing.

Graham Swings Wildly
Graham really is concerned about having to be more open with the citizens of Pennsylvania. Here are his remarks to the State Senate on Dominic Pileggi’s (R-Delaware County) Right-To-Know legislation along with my comments in the fashion of SOS.

Good morning, Chairman Piccola and members of the State Government Committee. Thank you for this opportunity to comment on Senate Bill 1, which seeks to amend the State’s Right-to-Know law in ways that will have a profound negative impact [Tell us how you really feel.]on Pennsylvania’s state-related research universities.

First, perhaps you are not aware, but Penn State already opens its financial books to you and the public. The online version alone represents 5,000 pages of [largely uninformative] budget detail. In fact, every year, as required by The Higher Education Fiscal Information Disclosure Act, we deliver detailed reports on our finances to the General Assembly and post the same information on our Web site. These reports (described in detail in an addendum) answer nearly every conceivable question about how we spend taxpayers’ funds except for the individual salaries of our employees.[Here is an exercise for the readers. Follow the links to the budget and try to find out how much the University spent to hold a Trustees meeting in New York City in November of 2004. Also see if you can find out who or what organization donated money to help defray the cost. This is relevant since it could have been someone or entity (RIAA?) with business before the University. I won’t sit around and wait to see what you find.]

Let me make myself perfectly clear – this proposal goes far beyond making Penn State accountable for how it spends public funds. Nobody would argue the point that the public has a right to know how public funds are spent[…, but I will.] But this bill will fundamentally change the way we operate, the way our trustees govern, and the way I administer their policies. [In the same way that the successful lawsuit opening up PHEAA’s finances has changed the way they do business.] Frankly, we will have to operate in a way that will make us less nimble and less competitive with the other major research universities in the nation. [When administrators start talking about nimbleness and competitiveness what they really mean is that they are worried that they will have to justify the unjustifiable]

And some editorial comments from around Pennsylvania

• The Daily Review in Towanda
Growing price in secrecy fight is outrageous

The Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency’s ill-considered legal fight to keep secret its lavish and self-indulgent spending had a high price tag that constitutes a further abuse of the public purse.

As reported by The Patriot-News of Harrisburg, PHEAA – the state student loan and grant agency – spent $409,000 on legal fees in trying to prevent the disclosure of unwarranted spending on board members, staff and clients. It also will be responsible for part of the $65,000 in legal fees incurred by three media organizations – The Patriot-News, The Associated Press and WTAE-TV of Pittsburgh – that had to sue to obtain PHEAA’s clearly public records.

PHEAA’s 20-member board of directors includes 16 state lawmakers, many of whom were beneficiaries of PHEAA’s lavish spending on junkets to luxury resorts, wining, dining, golf and other luxuries.

PHEAA’s funding comes from its own highly profitable operations rather than from tax money. But it’s all public money. And the squandering of more than $400,000 on legal fees to defend the squandering of other public money is a case of poor corporate governance, beyond a betrayal of the public interest.

• The Express Times
Only people reaping rewards of PHEAA fight are lawyers

When it finds itself in a hole, the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency keeps burrowing. When engaged in a dubious legal battle over public records, PHEAA keeps fighting – and writing six-figure checks to its lawyers.

It’s clear that stocking the board of the state’s college-loan agency with state lawmakers in an attempt to improve accountability is having, well, a predictable effect. In its defense, the board has tightened up travel policies.

PHEAA officials said they pursued the case to the state’s highest court because they wanted a definitive ruling, and because news organizations forced it to go through OPRA.

What a crock. PHEAA could have just released its records and used that $409,000 for student loans and grants.

• Harrisburg Patriot News
PHEAA spent $409,413 fighting to keep ‘retreat’ expenses secret
There’s only one likely explanation for why the higher-ups at the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency spent $409,413 on lawyers to fight a Patriot-News request for records of travel expenses incurred by its employees and board members:

They didn’t want to embarrass themselves with revelations of high, even ridiculous expenditures on themselves, money that otherwise could have – and should have – gone to help students overcome the high cost of going to college.

And PHEAA’s legal games aren’t over. Agency officials insist on charging this news paper – and The Associated Press and WTAE-TV in Pittsburgh, which joined our suit – $35,788 to blank out what they deem to be proprietary in formation.

This is a publicly created agency that has lost any sense of its need to be publicly accountable.

The PHEAA case provides clear evidence that sunlight is good, that it encourages a higher level of behavior from public servants than that which can be kept hidden from view. It also is clear evidence for a new, much tougher Open Records law, based on the premise that all records of state, local and county governments and their authorities, school districts and other governmental creations and major recipients of state funding, such as the state-related universities, are to be open unless specifically exempted by statute.

There shouldn’t have to be any more court battles and lawyer fees over open records. There should be cooperation. But only a new law is going to make that happen.

• The Daily Item
Where does the money go?
Senate bill would help citizens know
Paychecks and privacy seem to go hand-in-hand. While some people like to brag about their payday bonanza, others would rather not talk about it.

That sense of secrecy carries over to the public sector. On one hand, reluctance to disclose public-employee pay is understandable. A person’s earnings – in most cases – are between that person and the IRS. On the other hand, public expenditures are – by definition – the public’s business, and they should be part of the public discourse.

So where does the balance between privacy for government employees and the public’s right to know fall? Squarely with the public.

Full salary disclosure would open the door to scrutiny of public employees and their salaries, and lead to much debate. That is a good thing.

Scrutiny would help taxpayers understand how their government works, who benefits from it (and whether those benefits are fair or unjustified.)

At the same time, the public will gain a greater understanding of the true costs of doing governance. It should make for some interesting discussions, to put it mildly.

Public employees whose salaries are exposed for all to see will know instinctively that their other work should be exposed for all to see, too. There will be little incentive to keep any government secrets when their paychecks are posed on the Web.

For more information on open-records laws, see the Web site www.passopenrecords.org.

• York Daily Record
Blogging for open records
New site illustrates why citizens should demand more openness from government.

Often, when newspapers advocate fewer restrictions on public records, it’s seen as a press issue, one that only journalists care about and one that pits reporters against public officials.

In all of these cases, though, reporters aren’t the victims – we all are. In many instances, citizens are denied access to public documents.

But now, thanks to the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association’s passopenrecords.org blog, we have an example of government being denied information it needs to make decisions that affect people’s lives.

The tale, posted on the blog’s category that includes stories from citizens, took place in Orrstown in Franklin County.

In 2006, the borough council voted unanimously to put four-way stop signs at the intersection of Routes 533 and 433, the center of town. As it is, there are stop signs on Route 433. The intersection is a hazard, in part, because of speeders and a 30-degree bend in Route 533 that creates a blind spot for motorists on Route 433. The borough council, concerned about safety, petitioned the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation to put a four-way stop at the intersection.

PennDOT conducted a traffic and engineering study of the intersection. At the conclusion of the study, the department sent the borough a letter denying the request because it “did not meet the warrants.”

The borough council asked why and asked to see the report.

PennDOT responded that the report was “confidential.”

So what you have is one government agency denying another government agency access to information that led to a decision directly affecting public safety.

Incredible.

If this instance does not illustrate the need for serious reform in the way Pennsylvania handles public records, what will it take?

Transparency in government is essential for democracy to function. How are voters going to be able to make informed decisions about their elected officials if they don’t know what they’re doing?

This has got to change.

And you can make it happen.

Log onto passopenrecords.org and post comments. Write letters to your state representatives. Call them. Ask them about it when you see them on the street.

It is our government — all of ours — and we not only have a need to see what it’s doing, we have the right.