Members of the Citizens for a Better Parkville group are taking their concerns about transparency in city government to the Missouri Attorney General.
“The City of Parkville’s lackluster responses to open records requests indicate, at best, an irresponsibly deficient effort at openness,” Citizens for a Better Parkville said in a statement issued Monday, Jan. 14.
The citizens group also alleges that the city and Parkville Economic Development Council (PEDC) have attempted to evade the Sunshine Law to conduct public business outside of the public view.
While the attorney general’s office does not comment on its investigations, its policy is to review the complaint and, if cause is found, investigate.
Penalties for Sunshine Law violations are often difficult to enforce. According to the attorney general’s office, only a court can impose penalties if it finds that the Sunshine Law has been violated, and penalties are assessed only if the violation is found to be knowing or purposeful. A court may also void any action that was taken in violation of the law, but it is at the court’s discretion, after considering if it is in the public interest to do so.
Citizens for a Better Parkville, a political action committee formed last October, has filed 11 open records requests with the city and another seven with the PEDC.
Under the Sunshine Law, government bodies must respond to such requests in a timely fashion. According to Citizens for a Better Parkville, responses from both entities have been lacking.
Parkville city administrator Joe Parente told the Citizen last week that city staff have worked to respond to the requests as quickly as possible.
“The city has made reasonable progress in being responsive to the request for such a large volume of public records,” Parente said. “We have a small city hall staff and must continue to serve our residents, which is a priority. We continue to communicate on a regular basis with the requestor on our progress toward completing the tasks.”
The portion of the request asking for native formatting with metadata has proved problematic for the city, he said, as the city lacks in information technology staffing. The city was forced to engage a consultant to assist, he said.
In the complaint letter, the attorneys write that the city and PEDC may be holding impermissibly closed public meetings.
“Officials appear to have engaged in a deliberate effort to coordinate communications to avoid assembling a quorum in an open meeting, allowing them to conduct important public business in secrecy,” the complaint states.
They also claim that the city and PEDC have withheld records, or at least withheld data pertaining to the records, as the requests included the request for electronic metadata.
Private email accounts may have been used to evade the Sunshine Law, the letter states.
“It is concerning that they (the aldermen) would utilize a parallel, private email service to conduct public business when a public account – which the city retains – is readily available and purposed for public business,” the letter states.
Email may have been used to hold improperly closed meetings as well, the attorneys state. Improper in-person meetings may have also been held.
The letter also outlines disagreements between the complaining attorneys and attorneys for the PEDC, who have stated that the PEDC is not a quasi-governmental body and so only its records related to city appropriations are available under the Sunshine Law.