The bill, SB 1696 by Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco), specifically prohibits a state or local agency from entering into an agreement that makes information confidential or conditions disclosure on the permission of the other party to the contract.

In addition, the bill would specify that regardless of any contract term to the contrary, a contract for the purpose of conducting a review, audit or report between a private entity and a state or local agency is subject to the same disclosure requirements as other public records.

SB 1696 becomes law on Jan 1, 2009.

SB 1732 explicitly overturns a 2006 court decision, Wolfe v. City of Fremont, which ruled that communications among members of a legislative body do not run afoul of the bar on “serial meetings” unless the members actually reach a decision on how to vote on a matter before the body. The new law provides:

“A majority of the members of a legislative body shall not, outside a meeting authorized by this chapter, use a series of communications of any kind, directly or through intermediaries, to discuss, deliberate, or take action on any item of business that is within the subject matter jurisdiction of the legislative body.”

SB 1732, sponsored by Senate Majority Leader Gloria Romero, also amends the California Public Records Act to clarify that a local agency may not discriminate in allowing access to public records among members of a multi-member body.

The Governor’s signature is an important victory for the California Newspaper Publishers Ass’n, which had worked closely with Romero on SB 1732.

The text of the law is here.

Websitepulse.com, a commercial server and website testing service, has a tool you can use to test the accessibility, from behind China’s “Great Firewall,” of a specific website. The tool not only shows whether a site is blocked, but also compares load times from an internet connection inside China and selected connections outside China. Here’s the page on websitepulse.

Hear the radio interview here.

‘TRUMBO’ is a unique film that tells the story of screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, one of the Hollywood 10 who was subpoenaed 1947 by the Committee on Un-American Activities, but would not be intimidated by the witch hunt. Trumbo refused to answer whether or not he was a member of the Communist Party and was, subsequently, black-listed from Hollywood studios. Trumbo spent a year in prison for contempt of Congress and in 1956, under an assumed name, won an Oscar for ‘The Brave One’. Among his most famous credits are ‘Roman Holiday’ and ‘Spartacus’. ‘TRUMBO’ is based on the play written by his son and inspired by Dalton’s letters during this time. The film features an A-list cast, including Joan Allen, Michael Douglas, Nathan Lane, Liam Neeson and Donald Sutherland. This film is a tribute to the First Amendment and free speech, while exploring the repercussion of intrusions on our civil liberties.

To view more info about the film visit http://www.trumbothemovie.com

The case is Taylor v. Sturgell.  Here is the text of the Court’s opinion.

-PS

The bill passed out of the Senate and now must be heard in the Assembly Committee and, then, voted on by the Assembly.

SB 1370 comes in the wake of 12 documented cases of journalism advisors being punished after refusing to pull critical stories written by student journalists.

AB 2379
AB 2379 will also be heard on June 10th in the Senate Judiciary Committee, after having passed out of the Assembly. AB 2379 is a bill written by Assemblymember Noreen Evan and co-sponsored by the California Newspaper Publishers’ Association. It attempts to streamline the court records request process and eliminate unnecessary waiting times.

The bill would eliminate appeals of orders to unseal court records that were improperly sealed. This will bring about quicker writ review and eliminate delays. It is also similar to the process that has been speeding up California Public Records Act requests since 1989.

One of the most important aspects in need of close scrutiny are a city’s revenue projections. I would guess when Vallejo negotiated and approved staff compensation packages their revenue projections showed they could afford it. Most likely, the public that went along with the raises thought the city could afford it, not realizing the revenue projections were overly optimistic (which seems to be common when times are good).

It took me 3 years to get my city to describe their revenue projection model to me. I would assume other cities are similarly secretive or cryptic with their revenue projection models and assumptions. This can be a real problem because any long-term budget can be “balanced” by playing with revenue projections.

Cities can make a reasoned argument to keep negotiations secret. Keeping revenue projection models secret is inexcusable.

-Kevin Cummins
Encinitas, CA

From The Huffington Post:

- A suggestion for a different way to fund public employee pensions:
instead of the government entity gauranteeing a specific monthly dollar amount in retirement, to be paid out of tax income, have the government entity pay a negotiated amount into a pension fund that cannot be tapped by any government bureaucracy. The pay-out to retirees might fluctuate with ups and downs of the market, but even if the governmental body declared bankruptcy, the retirement funds would still be safe and protected, from all but inflation and market vagaries.

My own pension resembles what I have described, and it works pretty well. The CEO of the company I worked for cannot steal it for his golden parachute, and the company cannot use the pension funds to cover operating expenses.

From the Sacramento Bee editorial:

- Good article! I would go one more step & say that the Public, who pays the bills, should be allowed to vote for approval or disapproval of the union contracts. Right now, these bloated contracts are being approved by the same people who are taking campaign contributions from the unions - a clear conflict of interest. Let us vote - we will derail this gravy train.

- At one time, I believed in the current system because we elect these officials to do this job for us and we should let them do the job without being micromanaged. Unfortunately they have proven unable to stand up to the Unions, or unable to resist conflict of interest donations leading them to a sense of being in debt to the Unions, or for whatever reason they are unable to put the numbers together and see what bad financial decisions they are making. It is time for those who pay for the services to see what we are getting and at what price, BEFORE we sign the contract.

Serial meetings are informal meetings that take place outside of formal public meetings between public official either in person, by proxy or by telephone or email in an attempt to discuss public business without being subject to public scrutiny. Serial meetings are prohibited under the Brown Act, which governs meetings of local agencies.

SB 1732 says that officials ‘shall not discuss, deliberate or take action on many item of business’ outside of public meetings. The Senate passed the bill in a bi-partisan vote of 32-0.

Part of what helped pass the bill was work done by groups like CFAC, CalAware, the California Newspaper Publishers’ Association and Senator Romero to ensure that the language of the bill was clear. To this end, agencies’ staff members will continue to be allowed to individually brief members of a public body so long as they do not share the comments or positions of other members.

The bill will be heard by the Assembly sometime in June.

AJR 60
Assemblymembers Mark Leno and Noreen Evans filed Assembly Joint Resolution 60 last week, which urges Congress to enact a federal shield law for journalists. Co-authors include Senators Carol Migden and Tom Torlakson. AJR 60 is expected to be voted on this summer.

AB 1958
In 1978, the Confidential Records Program was enacted to shield peace officers’ addresses from the public for the officers’ protection. Since then the list of people protected under the program has been expanded to include the Attorney General, members of the legislature, veterinarians employed by the zoo, and many others.

Originally, this program kept DMV records private. But, since 1989 all DMV records have been protected from the public. Now, this program serves to further block contact and license plate information from ticketing and fine enforcers.

The OC Register recently brought to light the abuses that this system could be subject to. People that are shielded in the program are able to avoid traffic and parking laws.

Assemblymember Todd Spitzer declared that we would bring forth legislation to penetrate this veil of secrecy and go after abusers of the program. However, AB 1958, brought by Assemblymember Sandre Swanson, is seeking to expand the program to include firefighters and housing code enforcement.

AB 772
Assemblymember Bonnie Garcia sponsored AB 772 to require that charter schools include in their petition to create a school the assurance that they would comply either with the Brown Act, governing the meetings of local agencies, or the Bagley-Keene Act, governing the meetings of state agencies.

The bill is also sponsored by the California Charter School Association, which has encouraged its members to adopt and follow Brown Act regulations.

The bill was approved in the Assembly Education Committee and is now awaiting review in the Appropriations Committee.

AB 2917
A series of stories in the Sacramento Bee, Los Angeles Times and Bakersfield Californian exposed the misconduct that was taking place among some Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs), who are largely unaccountable for their actions.

AB 2917, from Assemblymember Alberto Torrico, aims to rectify this problem by creating more tracking of EMTs. However, the bill includes an over-arching public records exemption for reports of misconduct.

Though the Governor vetoed a similar bill last year, he is expected to sign AB 2917 if it reaches his desk.

Here’s the SacBee editorial:

-----
Editorial: Let public in on government labor deals

Published 12:00 am PDT Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Peter Scheer, who heads the California First Amendment Coalition, has a novel idea: End the secrecy surrounding local government labor contract negotiations.

You can understand the logic and the urgency behind his idea when you consider the situation in Vallejo. That city is filing for bankruptcy. Why? Local officials approved salary and benefits costs for current employees and retirees that are more than the city can afford.

Scheer’s point is that California law allows local government officials “to avoid public discussion of the true cost and fiscal impact of the pay deals that they have approved.” By the time the public sees anything, a union contract already is a done deal and no changes can be made.

In some states, all phases of the bargaining process, including negotiations, are open to the public (though government officials may discuss strategy for labor negotiations in closed session). Minnesota, Florida, Kansas and Tennessee are examples.

California is at the opposite extreme. The state’s Brown Act not only allows negotiations about salaries and benefits to be conducted behind closed doors, it allows local government officials to vote on a final agreement in closed session. Only after that vote and union acceptance of the contract does the local government have to let the public in on the deal. And only then does the text of the contract become a public record – when it’s too late to change anything.

The situation in Vallejo should cause legislators to revisit this nonsense. At a minimum, legislators should require local governments, before any vote, to publish a proposed contract and prepare a single, authoritative, easy-to-read document listing all parts of the offer, including cost. They also should require local governments to hold a public hearing to consider the financial ramifications of every labor agreement. The vote to approve or reject the contract should be held in public session.

The Vallejo debacle highlights a basic truth: the public that pays the bills should be able to see and question a contract before a vote, not after.

http://www.sacbee.com/editorials/story/932926.html

GIS “basemap” data is used to create the base layer for all local computer mapping. The bill sought to exempt from the Public Records Act, which requires all government data to be available to the public, “metadata, listings of metadata and assembled model data”.

CFAC has filed suit to force Santa Clara County to make available its county basemap as a public record, subject only to payment of modest copying fees. CFAC won in Superior Court and the case is now on appeal.  AB 1978 would have effectively overturned that pro-disclosure ruling.

The GIS community was rallied by Bruce Joffe, a GIS expert and consultant to CFAC in the Santa Clara case, to push Assemblymember Solorio to drop the bill.  Following publication of an open letter in Directions Magazine, the technologically-saavy GIS community quickly spread the word through geo-data blogs and on such sites as GIS Café, GeoSpatial Solutons, GeoPlace and POB Magazine.

The bill didn’t make it out of committee and Solorio, in a statement from his office, said he “decided not to push it forward”.

AB 1855
AB 1855 began as a bill about police interrogation tactics, but, after it lost that focus, Assemblymember Anthony Portantino considered adding two amendments that would have made police officer names and salaries private information.

The State Supreme Court ruled last year that salaries and officer names (though not personal contact info) are public information and subject to public disclosure laws. The AB 1855 amendments would have reversed these rulings.

The California Newspaper Publishers Association, CFAC and other organizations opposed the bill. Assemblymember Portantino ultimately decided to pull the Amendments.

SB 1370
In 2006, LAUSD newspaper advisor, Darryl Adams, allowed a student to write an editorial criticizing the school’s random search policy and subsequently found himself removed from his position as newspaper advisor, basketball coach and even basketball game announcer. Stories like this lead State Senator Leland Yee to propose SB 1370.

SB 1370 prohibits retaliation towards adults who are protecting a student’s right to exercise freedom of speech or freedom of the press.

Even now, in this edition of CFAC’s Flash Newsletter, is a story about a Vacaville newspaper advisor who allowed a student to write an opinion piece about a controversy at the high school. For this decision, the advisor claioms he lost his advisory role.

SB 1370, which would combat both these instances of abuse, passed out of the State Senate in a vote of 35-2 and is now awaiting approval from the Assembly

AB 2296
After a spate of violent attacks by animal-rights activists, including an assault on a researcher’s husband at her home outside University of California-Santa Cruz and a Molotov cocktail thrown through the home of a University of California-Los Angeles researcher, Assemblymember Gene Mullin proposed AB 2296, sponsored by the University of California, which would keep private all names of animal researchers.

However, the bill was construed broadly to include any “animal enterprise employees” and to permit the non-disclosure of “any information relating to animal research activities”. It is currently under close scrutiny by freedom of information groups, including CFAC.

The bill was approved by the original Committee and was passed on to the Appropriations Committee for further review. After CFAC and other organizations’ advocacy, the bill will be rewritten to take into account the public disclosure considerations, while still allowing for the protection of the researchers.

SB 1696
The Senate also recently passed SB 1696, revising the Public Records Act to prohibit government agencies from making contractual agreements with third parties that, as part of the agreement, keep information about the agreement confidential.

SB 1696 was approved by the State Senate in a vote of 33-1 and is awaiting a vote in the Assembly.

--Kelly Dunleavy, CFAC staff

I read and appreciated your article about China and the Internet which appeared recently in the International Herald Tribune. As a 20 year resident of China who has been on line here since 1996, I am intimately acquainted with the problems one encounters accessing information on line. As China becomes more sophisticated in its monitoring efforts (using equipment and technology developed in no small part by American companies), the situation is generally getting worse, not better.

Of the various greed driven rationales for making the compromises of principle necessary to participate in China’s Internet business, the one I find the most insidious posits that Chinese people are too busy shopping to care about freedom of speech, political rights or the rule of law. Certainly there are some Chinese whose lives seem to revolve around a mind numbing sort of consumerism. They are not that difficult to recognize; after all, more than a few Americans lead similar lives.

The “Chinese don’t care” rationalization, however, conveniently ignores the fact that many of those successful, middle class (as they are now labeled) Chinese filling shopping malls are thoughtful, articulate people. People who are discouraged and often angered by the arbitrary power of their government and its officials, the pervasive corruption they experience in everyday life, by the mixture of bland facts, half truths, distortions and occasional outright lies they hear or read in the government controlled media. These are people who realize they are getting a politically sanitized version of events or being mislead by official “news”. They realize that the state media often “lies by omission”, leaving out key facts which run counter to the “correct” point of view. At the same time the effort needed to find reliable, alternative sources of information in China is too much for them. Most of them know there are such alternatives out there, even in China, but are unwilling to take or do not have the time to wade through the rumors, fairy tales and wild stories which coexist with real information on Chinese blogs and bulletin boards.

The “Chinese don’t care” rationalization also conveniently ignores the enormous numbers of less articulate but no less thoughtful Chinese who are struggling to get by. The huge floating populations working for low wages in thousands of factories and construction sites in big cities all over the country. People with little money, little education and no upward mobility who have remained at home in small cities and villages. When it comes to these people we are told they are too busy trying to make ends meet to be concerned about \"luxuries\" like political rights or freedom of speech.

My experience suggests quite the opposite is often the case. Many low income Chinese know very well they are at the mercy of a system which is blatantly unfair and stacked against them. They know they lack the freedom to redress their grievances effectively. While they may not know any of the criteria scholars use to determine if a system is ruled by law; they know from personal experience that there is no such thing as the rule of law in China when it comes to the abuses they suffer. In short they know that they are powerless. And they know that going up against those with power - be it a supervisor cheating them of wages, the wealthy owner of an unsafe workplace or an official extorting extra-legal fees for \"services\" - is a risky business indeed, one in which they are more likely than not to be the loser.

In our efforts to find reasonable ways to be engaged with China, one of the first things we need to do is recognize that US and other Western companies directly benefit from the Chinese people\’s lack of political freedoms. Overseas companies can make favorable deals with Chinese government and business leaders (sometimes the same people wearing different hats) who are not accountable to their workers or ordinary Chinese people. If those ordinary people do not like the deals which emerge or feel they have been wronged or injured by powerful companies, complaining can involve considerable risk, particularly if the complaints in any way challenge the government\’s monopoly on power.  We should not let the cheap rationalizations and weasel words of Western executives, consultants and public relations liars obscure the facts. When we press publicly for human rights in China, when we question the efficacy of the rule of law in China, when we ask companies at least to be straightforward about how they must do business in China, we may anger the Chinese government, but we support the large number of Chinese people who do care very much about political freedom in their country.

Steve Barru
Beijing
http://www.stevebarru.com

The Sunlight award is given to the two stories in the California-Nevada region that best exemplify the use of public records in an effort to effectively shed light on issues of civic importance.

The award is judged and co-sponsored by CFAC and is given in association with the AP Newswriting and Photo Contest, which celebrate the best in print journalism from 2007. The winner of the Sunlight Freedom of Information honor is awarded a $500 prize, which will be delivered to the recipients later this spring.

A complete list of winners can be found here.

Sunlight Freedom of Information Award:

1. Jenifer B. McKim / The Orange County Register / Dying in Silence.
2. David Hasemyer / The San Diego Union-Tribune / How Sunroad’s Building Was Cleared for Takeoff.