Chicago School System On FOIA Requests: Stonewalling, Obfuscation, & Paper-Shredding
from the now-you-see-it,-now-you-don't dept
If you're a government with something to hide, there are plenty of shady ways to handle Freedom of Information Act requests. You can make sure your organization is legally allowed to carry guns and simply refuse, like the NYPD. You can also make a big deal about how requests are only honored for in-state residents, as if that were the spirit of the legislation. Or, if you're as big as the federal government, you can play a sort of bureaucratic hackey-sack game with the request for years before releasing the most non-useful information possible. The problem with all of these methods, however, is that they make those using them look petty, but they don't really cement their position in the corrupt jackasses category that I believe all government agencies secretly want to obtain.
Which is why we'll go to the Chicago city government, since they're the obvious experts in the matter. Here, Rahm Emanuel's administration has taken responding to FOIA requests to a whole new level, not only providing nothing in response to such requests, but then answering questions from the Attorney General with non-responses indicating they might just have proactively destroyed the documents being requested. This story begins with our vaunted public school system, the CPS. Glenn Krell wanted to get his hands on what research had been done when CPS put in a longer school day without bothering to give schools any resources to actually do anything with the extra time.
Krell figured CPS had done research on the longer school day because, like every parent in the system, he'd received a letter from Jean-Claude Brizard, then the CEO, claiming that "our elementary school students are receiving 22 percent less instruction time than their peers across the country." So he sent CPS a FOIA request asking for "the reports, statistics, comprehensive city-by-city analysis and other documents that back up the statement by Mr. Brizard."
CPS responded that "the district does not maintain any documents responsive to your request."Got that? CPS cites a statistic justifying the longer school day, Krell asks for the basis of that statistic, and CPS says there is no document for that. In internet terms, Krell asked for a citation and CPS was unable to provide one. In addition, Krell asked for information on how the city decided to achieve what it calls "selective enforcement tiers", by which high-performing schools are made available to lower-income families as a method for integration. This was another matter about which CPS had indicated its offices were just overflowing with research.
He knew CPS had lots of information on this matter because he'd read about it in the Tribune. In that article, CPS officials boasted about how they'd left no stone unturned in their effort to make the selection process as fair and objective as possible. They said the process considers data such as home-ownership rates in the students' census tracts and the share of homes where English isn't the primary language.The response to that request? CPS claimed there too it had no documents to turn over. But why? Had Brizard and CPS simply made the statistics and research claims up? To find out, Krell appealed to AG Lisa Madigan, which is exactly what the law indicates you're supposed to do if you get a fishy response to a FOIA request. Madigan's office dutifully asked CPS if such documents had never existed, or if they'd simply been destroyed. CPS responded that they had never maintained those records and they do not exist. The result of that non-answer was for Madigan's office to declare the matter closed.
And that's a problem, because CPS didn't actually answer the AG's question. They do not answer whether or not the documents ever existed at all, only that they never maintained them and they don't exist currently. One way to achieve that answer is for the research to never have actually been done, which would make CPS liars on multiple items it had addressed to parents and the press. Another way is for those documents to have been proactively destroyed instead of maintained, quite possibly so that they'd never have to be revealed for a FOIA request. Either way, that's crappy government. Add to that Madigan's shirking of her responsibility and it's difficult to take Emmanuel seriously when he claims his administration is "the most open, accountable, and transparent government Chicago has ever seen."
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Lowered expectations
Not exactly a high bar, though.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Lowered expectations
As if that meant anything.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Lowered expectations
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
This is still entirely possible.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
It must be the food
They must be awesome for people to put up with this nonsense.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Scum bags!
If You're Going To Illegally Seize Citizens' Cell Phones, At Least Make Sure You're Grabbing The Right Ones
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130519/19190923142/if-youre-going-to-illegally-seize-citize ns-cell-phones-least-make-sure-youre-grabbing-right-ones.shtml
IL Follows Suit: Employers Right To Ask For Social Media Passwords Codified Into Law
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130423/06214822806/il-follows-suit-employers-right-to-ask-so cial-media-passwords-codified-into-law.shtml
Illinois Bill To Outlaw Online Anonymity Dropped Because People Got Pissed Off, Not Because It's Unconstitutional
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130222/18003222079/illinois-bill-to-outlaw-onli ne-anonymity-dropped-because-people-got-pissed-off-not-because-its-unconstitutional.shtml
DOJ And Dept. Of Education To Colleges: Start Restricting Free Speech On Campus Or Kiss Your Federal Funding Goodbye
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130517/18345423136/doj-dept-education-to-colleges-start- restricting-free-speech-campus-kiss-your-federal-funding-goodbye.shtml
Supreme Court Rejects Appeal Over Law Banning Recording The Police
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20121126/14083621150/supreme-court-rejects-appeal-over-law- banning-recording-police.shtml
Seventh Circuit Court: Chicago Cops Can't Use 'Annoyance' As Reason To Stifle Free Speech
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120912/20384720366/seventh-circuit-court-chicago-cops-can t-use-annoyance-as-reason-to-stifle-free-speech.shtml
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Shultz of Hogan's Heros
"I know nothing! I see nothing!!"
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Gov. speak
"the most open, accountable, and transparent government" is actually Gov. speak for the most closed, unaccountable and opaque government ever.
Any time you hear a government agency utter those words, pack a lunch and prepare for an Everest sized attempt at finding out what's _really_ going on.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Gov. speak
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Gov. speak
- Bengazi cover up
- IRS focusing on and bullying conservitive groups.
- The AP phone records being violated
Am I the only one that thinks that Obama is looking more and more like a black Nixon?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Gov. speak
Nixon was very plainly a bastard and a villainous President.
But at least he got things done. Better than the shower currently in the Houses.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Gov. speak
The all have their heads up each others ass and keep calling people to complain how dark it is...losers.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Gov. speak
"IRS focusing on and bullying conservitive (sic) groups"--IRS focusing on and bullying liberal groups in 2006-07.
"AP phone records being violated"--Various Patriot Act-base actions 2001-2007
For everything Repubs claim Obama's done (and haven't proven), Bush did on a bigger scale.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Gov. speak
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Information
There need to be serious penalties for non-responsive FOIA replies. The only exception should be national security, and then only if legitimately invoked.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
This is actually still true though. Chicago is a complete shithole when it comes to local politics. Emmanuel is terrible but he's slightly less terrible than the rest of Chicago's long and storied history of terrible politicians.
Slightly.
Interestingly his main opponent when he got elected was apparently going for the "I'm legitimately mentally unbalanced and shout things without thinking about them" Howard Dean-style campaign, so Emmanuel was able to waltz through the election just by wearing snazzy suits and looking bemused all the time.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Civics Lesson
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Lefty Blows Himself
So the @GOP has FOIAed the IRS. How original. And political. So much for a bipartisan inquiry. Typical #GOPOverreach
Brad Woodhouse (@woodhouseb) May 22, 2013
Reeee,eeee,eeeeTard!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]