Oklahoma transparency headlines
From Sunshine Review
This article is a list of transparency related news from Oklahoma.
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| Report It • | The Good • | The Bad • | The Ugly | |
Tulsa, OK An Oklahoma lawmaker plans to introduce legislation within the next year that would make the video recordings taken from state trooper cars open to records requests. Senate Bill 1252, sponsored by Senator Jim Wilson would override previous legislation that had specifically exempted the cameras. [1]
When Oklahoma Open Books launched two years ago, it was one of the first websites devoted to state government transparency. The website tracks the overall spending of state agencies as well as their specific expenditures. In addition, the website lists the state payroll, state grants, and state contracts. [2]
Since Open Books launched, many other states have followed suit with their own government transparency websites. A critic from the OFRP, Peter Rudy, says that Oklahoma's website has fallen behind other states. Rudy notes that the website fails to disclose the travel expenses of individual employees, does not contain a check register, and does not track the reception of federal stimulus money.[3]
Tulsa, OK On October 8, 2009, the Supreme Court of Oklahoma modified their procedures for the release of the records of case information, in an attempt to bar the bulk release of case information.
The Court, which has historically maintained an online list of all criminal and civil court rulings through the Oklahoma Supreme Court Network and the On Demand Court Records websites, established a new internal rule which will prevent the disclosure of "all or a significant subset of electronic case information" [1]. The rule comes in response to a request from a business for all the Supreme Court records, which would have cost the business between $20,000 to $40,000 for the Courts to produce it. The court claims that the rule was made through consultation with the Oklahoma Open Records Act and the policies of supreme courts in other states. They also claimed that the rule was in compliance with current open records legislation and would not prevent future compliance.
"The UOSA records policy might become more relaxed to accommodate the student body at large.
In response to The Daily’s story about the UOSA records, Nicholas Harrison, member of the Graduate Student Senate, sent Student Affairs Vice President Clarke Stroud an e-mail voicing his concerns over the “restrictive” UOSA records policy."
"Tulsa County Clerk Earlene Wilson has removed a $1 printing fee for online records, effective April 1.
The change announced Tuesday for the county’s Web-based real estate records followed articles and an editorial published March 18 in The Journal Record, challenging that fee and others as violations of the Oklahoma Open Records Act."
"Attorney General Drew Edmondson said there is "not an excuse” for cities that are violating a state law requiring meeting calendars and agendas to be posted online.
A survey conducted by Oklahoma news organizations and FOI Oklahoma as part of Sunshine Week found at least nine cities are not posting either calendars or agendas for city council meetings on their Web sites."
"‘Acting on the advice of an attorney’ isn’t going to be an easy excuse for willfully violating the Open Meeting Act in the future,” said Joey Senat, Ph.D., OSU School of Journalism & Broadcasting and past president of Freedom of Information Oklahoma.
Senat, himself an attorney and a strong advocate of Freedom of Information in all government areas provided the court’s ruling to FOI members this week."
Oklahoma On November 1, 2009, a new Oklahoma law went into effect the forces Oklahoma law enforcement agencies to release all incident reports requested for under the Oklahoma Open Records Act that are not subject to other exemptions. The previous law required the police departments to release only reports that resulted in an arrest. [1]
"Oklahoma House of Representatives Public Safety and Homeland Security Committee Feb. 4 postponed consideration of a bill that would allow the chief medical examiner to withhold the public release of autopsy reports.
The bill was requested by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation following the release of autopsy reports on the unsolved murder of two girls near Weleetka in 2008.
On the surface the bill sounds like a good move, however the committee should throw the bill out and not even consider closing these records to the public. When the government starts closing records to the public it opens the door for corruption. One closed record will soon be followed by another until the public no longer has the right to know the truth."
"Grady County Sheriff Kieran McMullen is stonewalling a request for public records that could show he misused the county’s communications system to tell deputies that recent stories in The Express-Star were untrue.
The Express-Star made a verbal request Tuesday followed by a formal written request the next day for transcriptions of any reverse 911, mesaging, paging and dispatch communication that occurred on July 15."
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