Fort Monroe Authority’s bid to shield documents from public eye moves a step closer to reality

A bill that would exempt the Fort Monroe Authority from complying with certain provisions of the Freedom of Information Act is progressing through the General Assembly.

“I would say this is needed because some information is just private, and I don’t think we have freedom if we don’t have privacy,” Del. A.C. Cordoza said last week.

Cordoza, a Hampton Republican who sits on the authority’s board of trustees, introduced the bill in the House. Hampton Democrat Mamie Locke, another board member, is carrying the measure in the Senate.

The House of Delegates passed Cordoza’s bill Wednesday 60-40. Locke’s bill reported out of the Senate Committee on General Laws and Technology this week with a unanimous vote.

The authority is a political subdivision that oversees development on the state’s property at the fort, which ceased to operate as an Army base in 2011.

The bill would allow it to withhold “trade secrets, proprietary information or financial information” received from a private individual or entity for the purposes of complying with a lease, license, permit, or other agreements of a commercial or residential real estate nature.

Glenn Oder, the authority’s executive director, told legislators last week the bill was needed.

Developers were reluctant to do business with the authority because they don’t want their financial information to be subject to FOIA, he said.

Del. Danica Roem, a Manassas Democrat who voted against the measure, said she was skeptical.

“The Freedom of Information Act does not exist to comfort residential or commercial developers,” she said. “It is for the public to have the most amount of access to its government as possible.”

In an email to The Virginian-Pilot, Robert Kelly — director of the Gloucester Museum of History and president of the Fort Monroe Historical Society — said he’s concerned about the bill.

Kelly was an employee with the authority from 2011-19.

“The public servants trusted with the fort’s stewardship should have nothing to hide,” he wrote. “(That they are) spending time and resources tweaking FOIA to make it more difficult for citizens to obtain public information about future development and developers makes me uneasy.”

Lin Weeks, staff attorney with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, previously told The Pilot he was especially concerned by the provision regarding proprietary information.

The RCFP is a nonprofit that advocates for journalists and First Amendment rights.

Weeks said proprietary information has been given a “really broad construction” by the courts.

“I think the idea that proprietary information held by the Fort Monroe Authority (could potentially) be kept from the public is troubling from a transparency standpoint.”

Katie King, katie.king@virginiamedia.com