Friday, March 13, 2009
Bobby Gets Into the (Disappearing) Act
Posted by Clancy DuBos on Fri, Mar 13, 2009 at 4:06 PM
In case anyone hasn’t noticed or posted about it yet, this week has been “Sunshine Week,” a week during which those of us who profess to care about open government celebrate and agitate for more transparency in officialdom. Considering recent events in New Orleans, our city could be a case study in what goes right — and wrong — in the arena of official transparency.
We all know what has gone wrong locally: Mayor Ray Nagin has allowed (or caused) the deletion of many thousands of public records in the form of his 2008 emails and daily calendar entries; city Sanitation Director Veronica White has ignored important city protocols (put in place by Nagin) for the handling of public records requests; and Nagin has turned a tug-o-war with the City Council over the state Open Meetings Law and professional services contracts into a race war.
Some things also have gone right. In the area of public records, two judges at Civil District Court have reminded everyone that the rule of law still means something. Judge Rose Ledet slapped Nagin and City Attorney Penya Moses-Fields with individual fines for failing to respond to bona fide public records requests from WWL-TV reporter Lee Zurik. In another public records case, Judge Lloyd Medley upheld two important tenets of the state Public Records Law — attorney Tracie Washington’s right to view City Council (and other official) emails that are not privileged, and the Council’s right (as specifically set forth in the law) to withhold privileged communications from public view.
On other fronts, the city Office of Inspector General released a scathing report exposing insider deals in the city’s crime camera contracting process, and the Nagin Administration released a study of its own (done by an outside firm) exposing some of the same irregularities — although the OIG study is more comprehensive. Some suspect the administration report is an attempt to make former city technology officer Anthony Jones the fall guy in the crime camera fiasco (while shielding his predecessor and mayoral pal Greg Meffert). Even if that’s the case, the administration report plays a role in that it adds fuel to what I hope is a fire under the backsides of the feds and District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro.
In the midst the local firestorm, Gov. Bobby Jindal (or someone working on his behalf) has taken steps to remove from public view an important online document that is not a public record, but which the public nonetheless ought to be able to continue to see: his detailed platform from the 2007 campaign. Veteran watchdog and critic C.B. Forgotston posts about it HERE. Go read it. Get mad about it. Make noise about it.
Bobby Jindal, who promised us transparency, ethics reform and more as a candidate for governor in 2007, doesn’t want us to be able to refer back to all those promises now that he’s a year-plus into the belly of the beast. Forgotston has repeatedly reminded us of Jindal’s alleged broken promises by linking to various planks of Jindal’s campaign platform on the campaign Web site. Now someone has taken down that site and replaced it with (in Forgotston’s words) “a single propaganda site for Bobby.”
Forgotston is asking anyone who may have downloaded and saved Jindal’s online campaign platform to get in touch with him so that it can be re-posted for public reference … forever.
It’s Sunshine Week, folks. And the sad truth is, unless we help it, the sun won’t shine on its own. To paraphrase Barack Obama, we have to be the sunshine we’ve been waiting for.
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Comments (6)
Showing 1-6 of 6
GOOD POST KEVIN!!! This sucks on Jindal's part. Do we have to fight this issue to the death with every damn body in La politics??? sheesh!
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There is this thing called the Way Back Machine on the Internet. http://www.archive.org/web/web.php I believe it isn't the only one there is also an archive at Google. Everything on the Internet is saved. The joke is on the politicians that think they can just delete stuff. Mr. Dubos I know you are pretty tired of my comments by now but I am for real about this stuff. I also am not trying to be a smart ass but maybe you need to email me or some other IT/Web person that is on your staff before you post stuff like this. I don't really dig the stuff being taken down but it is a moot issue with the Way back machine recording every thing. You most likely think I am a partisan but I am really a libertarian and there is a big difference.
Red, My name is Clancy, not Kevin, but thanks for the compliment anyway. In a way, I'm glad people are starting to notice that Kevin is The Gambit's editor now, not me. Resista, No offense taken. As one who frequently criticizes politicians, I long ago realized that if I'm going to dish it out I have to be able to take it as well. For the record, I'm not tired of anyone's comments. That's what Sunshine Week is all about. In saying that I have misjudged you, I respectfully submit that you have misjudged me. I don't think you're a partisan -- just a citizen with a point of view, like the rest of us. In the case at hand, C.B. Forgotston (who first noticed the removal) also apparently didn't know about the archive. Thanks VERY MUCH for pointing it out -- you've done everyone a great service. Keep those criticisms coming, because we all need to be kept honest.
ok... point taken. My name is Kevin as well but I like resista better. Has anyone thought to just ask the Governor's office for a copy of his old platform? or the State Republican party? It would be hard for them to explain why they would not do that. The only reason I say that you may have misjudged me is I don't think that most people even know what libertarians are though our own fault. If someone takes one position or another many people (not you apparently) assume that libertarians are republicans or democrats. When in fact we are just libertine. I don't go for none of that old school party politricks. (sic) We in fact want all the sunshine all the time. Here are the other web archives I know about all on a single page. You should try them all. http://www.searchengineshowdown.com/others/archive.shtml It is very hard to delete anything off of the Internet. I tell people to be sure what they put on a facebook or Myspace is something they are OK with an Employer seeing 10 years from now. Tell your teen age children that especially.
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