Wednesday, June 26, 2019

[Santa Clara County] Editorial: Santa Clara must fix its troubled public records system

Civil Grand Jury report indicates city doesn’t comply with California’s disclosure law


When Lisa Gillmor became mayor of Santa Clara in 2016, she made transparency one of the city’s primary goals.
A Santa Clara County Grand Jury report released Tuesday makes clear that the city is failing to meet one of the most basic components of that objective.
A first-hand investigation by the civil Grand Jury “found that obtaining public records from the city is a time-consuming and difficult chore.” The Grand Jury concluded that Santa Clara is out of compliance with California’s public records law.
It’s unacceptable. And it raises a serious question: If the city of Santa Clara takes weeks to respond to records requests from an entity with the clout of a civil Grand Jury, how responsive is it to requests from individual residents?
The issue surfaced when Gillmor’s mayoral opponent in last year’s election, Anthony Becker, filed a complaint about two contracts the city awarded public relations consultant Sam Singer.
The city agreed to spend up to $200,000 to hire Singer for help with public affairs and media relations under two contracts — one for up to $100,000 with the Santa Clara Stadium Authority and another, also for up to $100,000, with the city itself. Santa Clara has a rule saying that the City Council must approve contracts exceeding $100,000.
The Grand Jury tried to investigate the complaint but was stymied by the city’s lack of response to its public records requests. That eventually led to the Grand Jury conducting its own investigation of the city’s compliance efforts.
The results left a lot to be desired. A summary of the Grand Jury report said:
“The grand jury encountered non-compliance by the city in response to its CPRA (California Public Records Act) requests. Noncompliance with the CPRA included non-responsive replies to the requests, invalid excuses for extensions of time, and incomplete document production. The city acknowledged its record-keeping system was disorganized and in need of improvement, but the city did not have an interim solution. However, the City’s progress towards implementation of an existing record-keeping software has been without a sense of urgency.”
The Grand Jury recommended the city take immediate action to fix the problem.
The city issued a formal statement taking issue with the Grand Jury report. It disagreed with the conclusion that the city was failing to comply with the law, noted that it had taken several steps to improve its efforts and remarked that problems with public records responses “are not uncommon in other municipalities.”
That doesn’t sound like a city that is making transparency a priority.
The public records request failures are only the latest example of a city in turmoil.
Since Jennifer Sparacino’s departure as city manager in 2012, Santa Clara has been plagued by high turnover and internal bickering. Walter Grossman’s  departure earlier this month as chief operating officer after only 1 1/2 years on the job is the latest example.
Gillmor’s longstanding “my way or the highway” approach as mayor isn’t helping matters.
Santa Clara needs to get its house in order. Starting with complying with the California Public Records Act.
June 21, 2019
The Mercury News
By Mercury News & East Bay Times Editorial Boards


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