AG Biden Issues NO CONSEQUENCES Opinion For DDOE And Governor Markell On Charter School Law Revision Meeting FOIA Violation

This half-measure makes me ill....THE DELAWARE WAY IN ACTION.....for shame.

(News Journal) Matthew Albright reports ~ AG: Charter study group broke open-meeting laws

Markell’s office said the group did not write the legislation and did not create a formal work product, arguing that meant it wasn’t a public body. The office also pointed out the Depart­ment of Education held a public meeting to discuss areas the group covered. But the AG’s opinion rejected those argu­ments. “Delaware citizens have important rights – rights protected in [The Freedom of Information Act’s] open meeting pro­visions – to observe the performance of public of­ficials and to monitor the decisions that are made by such officials in formu­lating and executing pub­lic policy,” the opinion said. “Those rights were frustrated with respect to the activities of the Work­ing Group.” The opinion points out that the group included high-ranking officials and was selected by the gover­nor. It rejects arguments that the group was “infor­mal,” saying the law’s goals still applied regard­less of how formal the meetings were.

Despite the ruling, the opinion does not call for any “remediation.” The opinion says the AG’s office sometimes asks public bodies that didn’t keep required min­utes to go back and recon­struct them from memo­ry, but says it won’t ask this group to do so. It says the group didn’t take any votes and says the effort to go back isn’t worth the benefit it would provide.

John Flaherty, presi­dent of the Delaware Co­alition for Open Govern­ment, sought the opi­nion. He said he’s glad to see the AG’s office stick­ing up for transparency, noting that rendering opinions on the gover­nor’s office is a “tough situation politically.” “The chief officer of this state should be set­ting the example for all the other bodies. That’s why we were very disap­pointed in the actions the Governor’s staff took in this case,” Flaherty said. “I think the important point here is that this working group has been found guilty in the court of public opinion, and I hope this sets a preced­ent moving forward.”

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