What Can You Do When They Ask for Your Email List?
Ohio Public Records Briefing - Edition #117
Welcome back, and congratulations on making it through the 100-degree heat and America’s 250th birthday celebration. Mark’s new children’s book about this special 250th year (God Bless America, 250 Years Strong) has been selling well, and TV and radio stations have been interviewing him about it.
Mark’s book relates well to public records because – 250 years ago – the founding fathers added their public records grievance to the text of the Declaration of Independence! Read it for yourself: “[King George] has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.” That’s 1776 lingo for “our government won’t let us see our own public records!” Sound familiar?
So let’s get into it.
This issue, we start with a fresh Ohio Supreme Court decision about a school district that refused to hand over the email list for its superintendent’s newsletter — and paid for it. Then we head to Los Angeles, where the LAPD gave its full critical-incident-video treatment to an officer shooting a charging dog. We ask what an Ohio release of the same footage would look like. We close with a question we continue to get: What can you charge the second requester for body-camera video you already redacted the first time around?