From the Boise Weekly

By Shea Andersen

The Boise Weekly’s efforts to open a sealed state investigation into Intermountain Hospital have stalled, for now, after a ruling from District Court.

In a ruling issued late Tuesday, Judge Michael McLaughlin ruled against the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare, and BW, both of whom had resisted a move to seal the state’s records of its investigation into the conduct of the troubled psychiatric hospital.

BW has yet to decide whether it will appeal the decision, according to publisher Sally Freeman.

Deputy Attorney General Robert Luce, who represents the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare, was not immediately available for comment.

“I am surprised by the decision,” said David Gratton, BW’s attorney from the firm Evans, Keane LLP. “The people of the state should be entitled to information the state gathers relative to the conduct of people licensed by the state.”

At question is whether an investigation into the operations of Intermountain Hospital’s residential teen care unit is a public record. BW had requested a copy of the investigation’s findings in December, under the Idaho Open Records Act. According to the Idaho Statesman, that newspaper and KTVB Channel 7 made similar requests.

Intermountain, located at 303 N. Allaumbaugh, is Boise’s only private psychiatric facility. Over several years it has been the subject of numerous complaints for understaffing, patient assaults on staff and fellow patients, medication errors, inappropriate discharges for financial reasons and, in one case settled out of court, the wrongful death of a teenage patient (BW News, “A Gathering Storm, 08/02/2006). The most recent incidents involved what adolescent patients and their parents referred to as a “riot” that required intervention by Boise police. Intermountain has temporarily closed the unit.

When they began their investigation, Health and Welfare spokesman Ross Mason confirmed that Intermountain’s violations are potentially serious enough to put its licensure into question.

Within a month, Intermountain had filed a complaint in District Court to keep those documents closed. They won a temporary restraining order from District Judge Joel Horton, who agreed with Intermountain that release of the investigation’s records would result in “immediate and irreparable injury, loss or damage.” Judge Horton, who has since recused himself from the case, ordered all records of the case sealed.

At the hearing last week, Intermountain attorney Mark Peterson told Judge McLaughlin said the investigation contained sensitive information about patients and staff, and should remain closed.

“Intermountain feels an obligation to do what it can to see that these records are protected,” Peterson said.

Peterson also said release of the documents could have a “chilling effect” on any such hospital’s desire to seek an operating license with the state of Idaho.

From the Boise Weekly

From The Idaho Falls Post-Register

The FCC announced Monday it was granting license renewal to KID-AM 590, overruling objections to comments made by Trish Oak and Halli Stone while on the air.

Mar 13,2007 – PAUL MENSER – IDAHO FALLS POST REGISTER
Trish Oak and Halli Stone left the airwaves more than a year ago, but a shadow they left hanging over their radio station, KID-AM 590, was not dispelled until Monday.

That’s when the Federal Communications Commission announced it was granting KID’S license renewal application, overruling objections that were filed in summer 2005.

Idaho Falls residents Seth and Andrea Grover and Kevin Murray, and then-Idaho House Speaker Bruce Newcomb had filed complaints about comments Oak and Stone made on their afternoon radio talk show.

But the often-controversial duo, which left the air in January 2006 in favor of nationally syndicated talk show host Laura Ingraham, had the protection of the First Amendment of the U. S. Constitution.

“I think that just vindicates the content of our program and our right to express our opinions, which is what the program was all about,” Stone said Monday.

Andrea Grover, a member of the Post Register Readers Advisory Board, told the FCC that the two sisters attacked her after Grover wrote a newspaper piece expressing her distaste for what she considered ostentation at the 2005 inauguration of President Bush.

In his complaint, Seth Grover called their programming “psycho-conservative garbage,” and Murray complained the two went overboard with their views.

Newcomb said he filed his complaint in objection to on-air comments about several people, but that he was particularly upset by comments that he thought impugned the character of state Sen. Bart Davis and showed insensitivity with regard to the 2003 shooting death of Davis’ son Cameron.

In its letter to everyone with objections, the FCC’s Audio Division Media Bureau chief, Peter H. Doyle, said the comments were protected by the First Amendment, the Communications Act of 1934 and the FCC’s rules.

“The role of the commission in overseein program content is limited,” he wrote. Although it enforces statutory prohibition on the broadcast of o g scene, indecent and profane material, “(The) Commission may not regulate the type of material about which the objectors have complained.”

The FCC renews the licenses of all radio stations in the United States every eight years. Had there been no objections, the renewal would have gone into effect Oct. 1, 2005.

“Anytime there’s a dispute, they do postpone renewal of a license until it’s investigated,” said Neica Kinney, eastern Idaho station manager for Clear Channel Communications, which owns KID-AM 590 and several other radio stations.

Those stations are part of a pending sale to Blue Point Media, an Illinois company that announced in February its intention to buy 22 FM, 13 AM and six translator stations in the Midwest and Mountain West. The $45.7 million sale won’t be final until the FCC has signed off on it.

Informed Monday of the FCC’s decision, Andrea Grover said she has no beef with KID-AM 590 now that Oak and Stone are off the air.

“That was my only concern with the station,”she said.

From The Idaho Falls Post-Register

From the Associated Press

By JOHN MILLER
Associated Press Writer

BOISE, Idaho (AP) _ To open or not to open government, that is the question Shakespearean actors may soon help answer.

Idahoans for Openness in Government last month won a $30,000 national grant to enlist the Idaho Shakespeare Festival troupe in a new video on state laws meant to keep the public’s business public.

The group includes journalists, law professors and state officials and was formed in 2004 to educate the media and public officials about Idaho’s open meeting and records laws. The grant came in time for Sunshine Week, a nationwide effort to draw attention to the public’s right to know.

”People who work in government have a lot of questions about open government, open records and the media,” said Betsy Russell, IDOG president and a reporter at the Spokesman-Review newspaper. ”That’s what we need: Everyone to know what the laws are, and to know how to comply with them.”

The open meeting law was enacted in 1974 and lawmakers passed an open records law in 1990.

And in three years, IDOG and Attorney General Lawrence Wasden have partnered on a dozen seminars around the state on open government issues, helping reduce confusion.
Still, questions regularly arise about how the laws should be applied, Russell said, and the new DVD will allow the group’s message to reach more people.

The money for the production comes from the National Freedom of Information Coalition, through the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

Idaho Public Television will help produce the videos, to highlight issues now bedeviling local elected officials, the courts and the state Legislature.

For instance, there’s an ongoing Supreme Court battle over an illegal private meeting by the Ada County Commission in 2005. This lent momentum to a proposed law change in the 2007 Legislature.

Meanwhile, in Boise County, in the mountains north of Boise, foes of a large subdivision plan sued the county commission last year, alleging it illegally barred them from a July meeting where the development was approved.

And in September, members of the Teton County Commission in eastern Idaho agreed to fines of $75 _ half the maximum penalty _ after meeting secretly in May.
Though that case was resolved, concerns over openness and local government ethics affected the outcome of the 2006 election, said new Commissioner Larry Young, who ousted one of the incumbents.

”The one violation was maybe just the last straw,” Young told The Associated Press. ”An amalgamation of things can poison the public perception. We’re not talking about national security. This is county government, which should be the people’s business.”

Idaho’s open meetings law obligates Wasden as the attorney general to enforce it for state government. Also, he’s often called in to prosecute cases such as the one in Ada County that so far has cost taxpayers more than $30,000 in legal fees. Commissioners there are fighting paying fines of as much as $150.

But it isn’t just local government that sometimes struggles with the law’s nuances, said Wasden.

He also fields queries from reporters, he said.

”A lot of media folks are coming in from other states, and while they may be familiar with the federal Freedom of Information Act and open records provisions of other states, they don’t know Idaho’s,” Wasden said.

Aides in Wasden’s office say they had received two to three inquiries per week about possible open-meetings or open-records violations before the IDOG seminars began three years ago. Now, it’s down to about one per month, said AG spokesman Bob Cooper.

Wasden will be featured along with the Shakespearean actors in the upcoming DVD.

The open-records group’s leaders say the production will include examples of what the state’s laws permit and forbid, storytelling, commentary _ and where the public can turn for resources should they feel they’ve been wronged by a violation.

”It’s a combination of vigilance and education,” said Elinor Chehey, a board member from the League of Women Voters in Boise. ”People are interested in seeing things happen out in the open.”

From the Associated Press

From the Associated Press

By John Miller
Associated Press
March 9, 2007

BOISE – Idaho State University asked legislative budget writers Thursday for money to match a $5 million donation from an undisclosed foundation to buy part of a warehouse where the Pocatello-based school wants to house health-science classes it now offers elsewhere around Boise.

Some Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee members knew nothing of ISU’s proposal until Wednesday and said they fear too much remains secret. As a result, discussions were postponed until next week.

The plan calls for spending $17.5 million to buy and renovate a third of a 320,000-square-foot warehouse in Meridian, Idaho, from the Meridian School District. The district bought it last year from Jabil Circuit, which shut down in 2002.

Besides the $5 million each from the state and the foundation, ISU would sell bonds to raise the remaining $7.5 million. The money would turn the university’s share of the warehouse into space for programs including nursing, dental hygiene and EMT training.

“It’s a wonderful opportunity,” said Kent Kunz, the ISU lobbyist in Boise. “The Meridian School District has made us a gracious offer to go into a partnership with them.”

Proponents said this shouldn’t be mistaken with plans for a southwestern Idaho community college such as one now being pushed by city and business leaders in Boise, Meridian and Nampa. Rather, ISU’s Meridian location would be a site where college students and 11th- and 12th-graders could take advantage of in-demand medical-field training from a four-year university at a single location.

Kunz said the private donation is contingent upon ISU buying the building. He declined to name the donor. “I will let them make their announcement,” he said.

The Idaho state Board of Education held an executive session in late 2006 and again Feb. 22 on the plan, Kunz said.

Public boards can hold closed sessions to discuss buying “an interest in real property,” according to Idaho’s open-meeting law.

When asked if the impending $5 million donation was the subject of the private meetings, Jeff Shinn, the board’s fiscal officer, said: “When a board talks about purchasing real property, they talk about the funding sources that are going to be used to purchase that real property.”

Some JFAC members said ISU’s last-minute proposal, accompanied by a mysterious donor and scant details hammered out in closed meetings, made them skittish, at least in part because they remember the consequences of the University of Idaho’s failed University Place project in 2002.

UI’s $136 million, three-building plan to expand in the state capital on growing Boise State University’s turf left the Moscow school and its foundation millions in debt.

“There’s obviously some secrecy,” said Rep. Margaret Henbest, D-Boise and a JFAC member, of ISU’s proposal. “I first heard about it last night. If it’s such a great idea … why did they wait until the end of the session to introduce it?”

Henbest added: “They said (about University Place) ‘Trust me, it’s a great project.’ It just feels like that, absent any details.”

Rep. George Eskridge, R-Dover, also said he wanted to hear more about the plan.

“Five million bucks is pretty significant,” Eskridge said.

“We’re all a little jumpy, because of (University Place).”

From the Associated Press

From the Idaho Falls Post-Register

Feb 14,2007 – Marty Trillhaase – IDAHO FALLS POST REGISTER

Seventeen years ago, Idaho lawmakers adopted this simple premise: When it comes to government records, the public’s business is public. Closed records are the exception, not the rule.

In a new bill, the state Agriculture Department wants to turn that sound idea upside down. It’s focused on a couple of laboratories — one for seeds and another for animal health — which perform tests for producers. A farmer may want to know the percentage of his seed that germinates and how pure that seed is. A rancher may want to test his herd for bovine viral diarrhea. Ag’s case comes down to this: The information presents no public health threat. It’s more of a trade secret — competitors would love to know about it. And under the current law, those competitors are entitled to obtain it.

Those labs depend on producer-initiated testing for half their budgets and a good share of their work load. Testing done to enforce state agricultural regulations is a matter of public record.

So if producers seek out private testing — inevitably from out-of-state firms — the state labs would be undermined. Moreover, Ag would have a less complete picture of what’s going on in the state.

Nevertheless, these are taxpayer-funded facilities. If there’s a market for confidential testing, perhaps Idaho’s economy could develop private labs.

Ag has backed off from its initial stance — it wanted to include results from its dairy and plant pathology labs under the security blanket. And new Director Celia Gould comes to this post with a proven record of openness in government.

Still, it wasn’t that long ago that former Director Pat Takasugi had to be dragged into the Idaho Supreme Court because he sought to hide so-called “nutrient management plans” — how large feedlots plan to handle huge amounts of animal wastes — by sending them back to the feedlot owners.

Moreover, you don’t have to try very hard to find producers who complain about Ag’s testing program. So who is served by shielding Ag from public scrutiny — the producers or the agency?

Then there’s the precedent. Ag is not seeking merely the authority to deny some public records requests on the grounds of trade secrets, for instance. (That s been a common practice — lawmakers have closed 82 categories of records since 1990).

Here, Ag wants to start from the premise that all of these records are beyond the public’s grasp — unless the director decides differently. That’s a lot of discretion to put in the hands of a gubernatorial appointee.

What’s next? How long will it take for Gould’s counterparts at Health and Welfare, state prisons or the Department of Environmental Quality to seek similar authority?

Let’s not travel this path.

From the Idaho Falls Post-Register

From the Spokesman-Review

Feb 10,2007 – Taryn Brodwater – SPOKESMAN REVIEW

The Idaho Department of Insurance is investigating an insurance fraud complaint against two commissioners for the Northern Lakes Fire Protection District.

Commissioner Larry House leveled allegations against Commissioner Terry Thompson and Chairwoman Lynda Thurman in December.

House told the Kootenai County Sheriffs Department that Thompson twice declined health insurance coverage through the fire district, then later asked a secretary to add him to the plan “because he had developed a heart condition and realized he needed insurance to cover it,” according to a sheriffs report released Friday.

Thompson told secretary Valerie Knapp he needed the insurance request “back-dated” to Aug. 1, House said in the report.

Though Thompson is employed with the Spokane Valley Fire Department, he allegedly didn’t want to make a claim under the department’s insurance plan “fearing that he would be taken off his normal duties due to a heart condition,” House told the Sheriffs Department.

Thompson said Friday he had seen the sheriffs report and it was “inaccurate.” “If you print anything on the police report it’s going to be inaccurate,” he said.

Asked what was inaccurate, Thompson said, “I’m not going to go into that.”

In a Dec. 26 interview, he refused to discuss his request for insurance coverage.

House told the Sheriffs Department that Commissioner Larry Clark refused to sign the letter requesting coverage back to Aug. 1 and Knapp went to Thurman, who signed.

Thurman said previously she didn’t know until after signing the letter that another commissioner had refused to sign.

But House said Thurman “signed the letter knowing that it was previously denied,” according to the sheriffs report. Thurman and House did not return calls seeking comment.

Northern Lakes Fire Chief Marion Blackwell referred all questions to the district’s attorney, Larry Beck. Clark also referred questions to Beck, saying the elected commissioners had agreed to have him “speak for the district.” Beck did not return a call Friday afternoon.

Clark said he was surprised the Sheriffs Department released the report. He said he hadn’t seen a copy and “was under the impression it wasn’t being given out publicly.”

Commissioner Dennis Arnende said he was “out of the loop.” “They told me nothing,” he said. “Until this all gets settled, I’d just as soon stay out of it anyway.”

Minutes of a Dec. 18 meeting showed all five commissioners present when Thompson’s request for coverage was discussed. The minutes note that “there was disagreement on the appropriateness of the request.” Thurman left the executive session after about 20 minutes, according to the record, and discussion continued.

House told the Sheriffs Department that Clark asked Thompson during the meeting if he had advised the district’s insurer of his heart condition and if he’d submitted a claim for reimbursement. House said Thompson replied he had not and became upset after further questioning. Thompson then reportedly said, “If it means so much to Commissioner Clark, I’ll cancel the claim,” the report stated.

House said Thurman became upset when she was asked why she signed the letter, “stormed” out of the room and began crying, according to the report.

The Northern Lakes Fire Protection District rejected a public records request from The Spokesman-Review seeking the letter Thurman signed.

Attorney Beck wrote in a Feb. 2 letter that Chief Blackwell had told him to deny the request because “it contains personnel information that is exempt from disclosure.” Beck’s denial said the document ” was intended to be kept confidential.”

Kootenai County sheriffs Capt. Ben Wolfinger said the Sheriffs Department turned the investigation over to the Idaho Department of Insurance because it’s within “their field of expertise.”

From the Spokesman-Review

From the Twin Falls Times-News

Feb 3,2007 – Matt Christensen – TWIN FALLS TIMES-NEWS
BOISE – A House bill regarding public records is ruffling the feathers of environmental groups, but the bill’s supporters say the hubbub is a misunderstanding over wording.

The Idaho State Department of Agriculture wants the Legislature to pass a bill that would keep its laboratories’ test results confidential. Environmentalists say the bill’s wording is unclear , and withholding information from the public is un-American.

“We had a lot of folks jump to the conclusion that the bill covers water-quality samples and things like that,” said John Chatburn, deputy administrator in the ISDA’s division of animal industries. “And it doesn’t.”

House Bill No. 59 would seal ISDA lab results from the public. The agency sends tests involving environmental issues to non-ISDA labs, and those test results, Chatburn said, would remain in the public domain.

Others aren’t sure that’s true.

The wording in the bill makes unclear exactly which lab results would be kept confidential, said Courtney Washburn, community conservation director for the Idaho Conservation League, an environmental and watchdog group. “We’re not sure what the bill would entail,” she said.

That seems to be the consensus of environmentalists statewide, including Parma resident Alma Hasse, who used lab test results to shut down a Washington County dairy last spring.

“By attempting to shield more information from the public, it seems to me that we need to look even harder at what’s going on,” said Hasse, who has accused state agencies of stonewalling public-records requests.

That’s not what this bill is about, said Chatburn. The motivation behind the bill is, in part, to protect companies from trade-secret thefts, he said.

“The bill would protect the information that comes from tests we run for companies,” he said, “when (the tests) don’t involve enforcement activities.”

The bill leaves it up to the ISDA director to determine which lab results become public, and that raises the concern of at least one legislator in the committee in which the bill was presented.

“That’s putting up a flag for everybody,” said Donna Pence, D-Gooding, who sits on the House Agricultural Affairs Committee. “I’d like to see a whole lot more information on this, because it seems to me, and a whole lot of other people, that (ISDA) just slammed the door on public records.”

The bill is yet to be placed on the committee’s calendar, but it’s likely it will be discussed in the coming weeks.

From the Twin Falls Times-News

From the Idaho Statesman

Gov.-elect Butch Otter signed his official oath of office without announcing it Thursday, ignoring requests from news media outlets to witness the event on the public’s behalf.

Otter will have a ceremonial swearing-in Friday at the Capitol and had originally planned to take the legally required oath on Monday, the day he takes office.

As first reported Friday on IdahoStatesman.com, Otter signed the oath at 12:05 p.m. Thursday with Secretary of State Ben Ysursa and Deputy Secretary of State Miren Artiach in Artiach’s office. There were no other witnesses and no public announcement. The oath will be stamped to record its receipt on Monday, Artiach said.

Ysursa said Otter came alone on the spur of the moment, although he first made sure Artiach, a notary public, had not gone to lunch. Dressed in a blazer, tie, khaki pants and cowboy boots, Otter signed the oath form “on a magazine or something,” Ysursa said. “The thing was over in a matter of minutes,” he said.

Otter did not respond to repeated requests for comment Friday. His spokesman said he could not reach him.

“He doesn’t want to distract from the public event on the 5th, and he felt like this thing was kind of a tempest in a teapot and a storm of the media’s creation,” spokesman Jon Hanian said. “He says this is not a big deal. It is purely ceremonial and perfunctory and not that big a deal.”

Hanian said Otter still plans to take the oath again privately for out-of-state family members on Monday, with U.S. District Judge Ed Lodge administering it. Hanian said he did not know where or when that would happen, and he said the public and press are not invited.

Otter’s actions are completely legal, Artiach said. Four other statewide elected officials have taken and signed their oaths early, too. “As long as they’re in here by the date they take office, there is no issue,” she said. “He’s not pretending in any way to have already taken office.”

Idaho’s two previous elected governors, Phil Batt and Dirk Kempthorne, allowed reporters to witness their oaths. After Otter said he wouldn’t allow that, the Idaho Statesman and the Associated Press asked him Wednesday to change his mind.

Statesman Managing Editor Bill Manny said Friday that he thought the point had been made that the public, through the press, should be able to witness Otter’s constitutional assumption of power. The paper has no plans to pursue the matter further, he said.

“We’re terribly disappointed the governor-elect didn’t see fit to include the public and press in what is a very vital moment for our state and government,” Manny said.

Jim Weatherby, a retired Boise State University political scientist, said Thursday’s oath could indicate that Otter won’t be open with the press.

“All of this may very well be much ado about nothing, and I hope it is — that it is merely an isolated event of questionable public relations,” Weatherby said. “However, if this becomes part of a pattern of denying access, then it does not auger well with for new administration.”

Idaho’s constitution says the governor, like all executive officers, must take office on the first Monday in January after the election. An Idaho law says the oath must be taken before he “enters upon the duties of his office.”

Artiach said it’s not uncommon for a public official to take the oath before its official due date, especially when that date falls on the New Year’s holiday.

But Idaho Press Club lawyer Allen Derr said he reads the constitution to say the governor should take the oath on the day he takes office, not before.

“I think that’s skirting what I consider to be the clear terms of the constitution,” Derr said. “The constitution starts a four-year term on the first Monday of January, and the old governor’s term doesn’t end before then.”

Derr said official government actions should be taken in public. “I can’t imagine a governor not wanting to do it in the open,” Derr said.

It is not known how many previous oaths of office were open to the public or press, but Artiach said many previous governors have more than one oath on file. Most recently, seven-month Gov. Jim Risch took the oath privately at home.

Seventy-eight percent of people said Otter should let the media in to cover his oath, according to an unscientific online poll of 1,755 people conducted Thursday at IdahoStatesman.com.

Other elected officials also have taken their oaths early this year, Artiach said. On file already are signed oaths from Attorney General Lawrence Wasden, Treasurer Ron Crane, Schools Superintendent-elect Tom Luna, and Ysursa. State Controller-elect Donna Jones and Lt. Gov.-elect Risch, now governor, will take their oaths on Monday. Of these officers, only Risch has announced that his Sun Valley oath-taking will be open to the press.

Topics Editor David Staatscontributed to this story. Contact Shawna Gamache at 377-6416 or sgamache@idahostatesman.com.

From the Idaho Statesman

From the Idaho Business Review

by By Eddie Kovsky

Jack Sjostrom’s company, Sentry Dynamics, collects information on Idaho properties and compiles it into a software application. His customers can access it through a Web browser to learn about individual parcels, to find maps and to facilitate real estate transactions all over the state.

Rather than traveling to courthouses or searching Web sites, Sentry Dynamics customers use the software to access data in one place.

It’s not that easy for Sjostrom. In fact, some public agencies are making things more and more difficult for him and others to stay in business.

Access to public electronic data isn’t always free or even provided for a reasonable fee. The cost of obtaining geographic information system (GIS) data varies widely from county to county, Sjostrom said.

Basic GIS information from Latah County is 10 cents per parcel. Order data for more than 15,000 parcels and it’s a flat fee of $1,500. Throw in ownership information about the parcels and it costs 5 cents more per parcel.

Want your data to include roads, the rural address, zoning districts or precincts? Each requires additional fees.

“That parcel information is a very small file that fits on an email attachment,” Sjostrom said. “The cost of copying on a CD and mailing it to us shouldn’t be more than $25.”

In contrast, Ada County shares map data amongst various agencies, said Mike McClenahan, administrative services manager. Basic map data is available through a subscription, he said. A CD with all parcel data is available each quarter for $100, said Anne Kawalec, land records supervisor.

Some departments create maps for specific projects, usually for internal use.

“But if somebody asked for that, we’d probably just give it to them,” McClenahan said.

Like Ada County, Nez Perce County charges a few hundred a year to copy information, Sjostrom said. But Bonner County refused to share GIS data until Sjostrom sued them, he said.

“Now we pay $150 per request,” Sjostrom said

In Kootenai County, access to GIS information is free, he said.

Idaho law has several statutes covering access to public information. Idaho Statute 9-338 states that a public agency can’t charge a fee that exceeds the cost of copying information.

But there is a specific exception to county governments and GIS data. Statute 31-875 (2) allows a county to collect fees not just for the release of public information, but also for the development and maintenance of the system itself.

Sjostrom thinks the laws just allow county commissioners to be creative about their pricing. He said he has taken up the issue with prosecuting attorneys in several counties, but it hasn’t gotten him very far.

“They say it’s very costly to install and support these GIS systems and they need funding to support that,” Sjostrom said. “But I question that because it’s no different from any other management system the county uses. Why is the mapping system unique?”

Not all counties use the same systems or have the same level of sophistication, so using fees to cover development costs is justified, said Dan Chadwick, executive director of the Idaho Association of Counties.

“Every county is trying to make an honest estimation of what providing the information costs,” he said. “Not all the data is compiled in the same way. Systems are part of the cost of providing information.”

Sjostrom is far from satisfied with that answer.

“Taxes pay for equipment,” he said. “All we should pay for is material and staff time.”

Sjostrom has decided to take up his grievance with the state legislature. When members of the legislature visited Post Falls last month, he met them in a hallway and handed out a letter explaining his predicament:

“I fully understand the intent of this law as it was written prior to the technological advancements we are now accustomed to … It was a way for counties to accommodate the costs of technology advancement and new data development. This justification however, does not conform with our system today …”

So far, Sjostrom has only heard from State Sen. Brad Little, R-Emmett.

“I thought we’d fixed this a year ago,” Little said. “I don’t think we should expect we’re going to provide a source of income to buy new equipment and personnel. We need to ask the counties to sit down with the title companies and everybody that uses those services and come up with some reasonable fee. We might have to write legislation, but I’d much rather have them reach something reasonable on their own accord.”

Aside from the implications for his own business, Sjostrom believes the current fees for public records affect everyone.

“We don’t feel it’s fair that five or 10 individuals asking for this data have to pay,” he said. “Does each one of those people have to pay thousands? Does the 11th person get it for free? There needs to be some systematic approach to this at a state wide level.”

From the Idaho Business Review

From The Spokesman-Review

Betsy Z. Russell
Staff writer

Idaho’s public records law says all public records are open to the public unless they’re specifically exempted, and there’s no exemption for explicit e-mails sent by public employees on the job.

“There’s no specific exemption for e-mails, for any communication,” said Deb Kristensen, a media law attorney in Boise and a partner with Givens-Pursley law firm. “The public records act absolutely makes everything open. When a public employee is using public resources to conduct his or her business, those writings, regardless of form, are going to be considered public records.”

Kootenai County has repeatedly denied public release of certain county employee e-mails on the basis that the messages are private, even though they are created using publicly owned computer systems and the county’s policy states that e-mails are public records.

Attorneys for county employees have argued that public employees have a constitutional right to privacy that overrides the state open records statute.

Using that argument, the county is withholding an undisclosed number of e-mails between Kootenai County Chief Deputy Prosecutor Rick Baughman and three women who worked in his office. County officials have cited the privacy argument in declining to release the records.

In 2005, the county used the same argument in refusing to release 889 e-mail messages between County Prosecutor Bill Douglas and Marina Kalani, the former coordinator of a county juvenile court program.

Idaho District Judge John Stegner, in a July 2005 decision, ruled that county employees’ e-mails are public record. The case involved a lawsuit by The Spokesman-Review against Kootenai County for release of the Douglas-Kalani e-mails.

Douglas and Kalani appealed that ruling to the Idaho Supreme Court, but Douglas later dropped his appeal, while Kalani’s is pending. The court is not yet scheduled to hear arguments in the case.

Idaho’s Public Records Law contains dozens of exemptions from disclosure for specific types of information, from investigatory records of a law enforcement agency while the investigation is in progress, to medical records, trade secrets, and information in people’s individual income tax returns. But it says nothing about personal e-mails between government employees.

“So if they choose to use inappropriate language or include improper attachments, those are all going to be considered public record,” Kristensen said. “It’s just poor judgment in terms of using that language or putting those attachments on. But it doesn’t change the nature of the record. It’s still a public record.”

State Rep. George Eskridge, R-Dover, who has spoken out on public records issues in the state House of Representatives, said, “My opinion is when you’re using a government-supplied computer, the information you put on there is public information open to the public. I guess that makes it pretty simple.”

In response to a recent request for employee e-mails, the county on Tuesday gave The Spokesman-Review some sexually explicit e-mail exchanges between Baughman and a woman who worked in the prosecutor’s office and has accused him of sexual harassment.

Citing its privacy argument, the county had intended to withhold the e-mails, which included nude photos and sex videos, but inadvertently gave them to the newspaper on a computer disc.

“It just seems like this is the kind of information the public should be entitled to see, if your public officials are sending around naked pictures of people,” Kristensen said. “Is that really what they should be spending their time doing? The public has a right to know that.”

Eskridge said public employees at work should not be sending explicit e-mails.

“It’s not the right thing to do, it’s just not the right use of government-supplied equipment,” he said. “I mean, you’re in a public office, doing business for the public, and all transactions that you do should be in the interest of the public. If you want to do something privately, do it on your own equipment, or do it by personal mail that you’re paying for.”

In his July 2005 ruling, Stegner ruled that the public has a right to read the full contents of the e-mail exchanges between Douglas and Kalani.

Stegner ruled the e-mail messages fall under the state’s open records law because they were written on county property and contain information “relating to the conduct or administration of the public’s business.”

The judge rejected arguments by Douglas and Kalani that releasing the messages would infringe on their constitutional right to privacy and that the contents of the messages were also protected as employee records.

“E-mails between a supervisor and his subordinate are not personnel information; they are communications regarding the operation of the public’s business,” Stegner wrote.

From The Spokesman-Review