Pennsylvania Judge Exempts School District Documents and W-2 Forms

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[edit] October 16, 2009

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Monroe County, Pennsylvania Monroe county judge, Ronald Vican, overturned two rulings of the newly founded Office of Open Records (OOR) this month, dealing a blow to Pennsylvania transparency and open records. The cases revolve around a number of school district documents including information packets and W-2 forms.

[edit] Predecisional packets declared exempt

The first case stems from a request made by Rev. Andre Felder, for information packets circulated between the school superintendent and the school board members. The board originally rejected the request because the task of separating exempt, deliberative material would be burdensome and severely reduce the contents of the packets. While the Pennsylvania Office of Open Records, ruled in favor of Felder, Judge Vican overturned their decision, on October 7, 2009 declaring the entire contents of the packets exempt as deliberative process material. In his ruling, the judge stated that"The Board packet was pre-decisional in nature. There is no evidence that the material in the Board packets was issued for the purpose of rendering a decision, or that the Board did anything but informally review the packets for its own edification."[1]

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[edit] W-2 forms declared exempt

The second case stems from a request made by Mary Ann Zeldenrust. Zeldenrust requested W-2 forms in an attempt to determine how much of the school districts administrators "mileage reimbursements" were actually reimbursing driving or just augmenting salaries. Again the OOR ordered the materials released, with personal information like addresses and social security numbers redacted. Judge Vican, agreeing with the arguments of the district, overturned OOR and ordered the documents exempt because they contained confidential financial decisions relating to taxes mad by the employees.

[edit] Appeals

Terry Mutchler, executive director of the OOR, stated that her office planned on appealing the judges decision concerning the packets, but was not planning on appealing the second decision due to limitations on office funding. However, Zeldenrust told the press that she planned on appealing the decision.

[edit] See also

[edit] External Links

[edit] References

  1. ↑ The Pocono Record, "Monroe County judge overturns two open records rulings"


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