D.C. government transparency examined

  D.C. Council Chair Phil Mendelson made his discomfort with public oversight clear under questioning by Kathy Patterson at the 2013 D.C. Open Government Summit March 13 at the National Press Club.

  There are degrees to what is acceptable to everybody,” heCoalition Pres. Kathy Patterson quizzes D.C. Council Chair Phil Mendelson at Sum told more than 100 attendees at the Sunshine week event sponsored by the D.C. Pro Chapter, the D.C. Open Government Coalition, the Press Club and the American University journalism school. Patterson, a former Council member, is the Coalition's president.

  Public access to Council members' emails was the topic for David Zvenyach, the Council's general counsel, and James McLaughlin, co-chair of the Coalition's Legal Committee. The Council recently settled a lawsuit the Coalition filed for access to emails about public business sent or received through Council members' private email accounts. Zvenyach cuted the Council's new policy requiring members and staff to use their government accounts to conduct public business whenever possible, and to copy their government accounts when they communicate through their private accounts. He gave assurances that when necessary in response to Freedom of Information Act requests, member and staff private accounts will be searched for records responsive to requests.

  Robert Spagnoletti, chair of the Board of Ethics and Government Accountability, said he expects the Board to appoint a director for the Open Government Office by early April. The Council created the Office in 2010 to oversee the Open Meetings Act, but the director's position has gone unfilled since the statute took effect April 1, 2011. Spagnoletti and Fritz Mulhauser, co-chair of the Coalition's Legal Committee, then discussed an audit showing spotty Open Meetings Act compliance by 27 boards and commissions in the first year under the new law. No public body audited is fully compliant, and some did not even minimally meet requirements to post advance notices of meetings, agendas, meeting minutes or other records memorializing what transpired. Spagnoletti said establishing the Open Government Office and training are keys to improving compliance.

  In opening remarks, Kenyan McDuffie, chair of the Council's Government Operations Committee, which oversees the FOI and Open Meetings statutes, said he would work with the Coalition, the media and others to improve public access to government.

  Sunshine Week is a national initiative in which SPJ participates to encourage dialogue about open government and freedom of information. It is held annually in mid-March.


Photo by Kenya Downs, a graduate fellow in the American University School of Communications, Journalism Division.