FOIA Friday: $223 for one email, Portsmouth needs redo on pay records
File cabinets. (Getty)
One of the less noticed features of the Virginia Way is the long-running tendency of the commonwealth’s leaders to conduct their decision-making behind closed doors. While the Virginia Freedom of Information Act presumes all government business is by default public and requires officials to justify why exceptions should be made, too many Virginia leaders in practice take the opposite stance, acting as if records are by default private and the public must prove they should be handled otherwise.
In this feature, we aim to highlight the frequency with which officials around Virginia are resisting public access to records on issues large and small — and note instances when the release of information under FOIA gave the public insight into how government bodies are operating.
Richmond City Council staffer says it costs $223.30 to pull one email
A staffer for the Richmond City Council told activist Josh Stanfield he would have to pay an upfront deposit of $223.30 in order to receive a single email in the council’s possession.
Stanfield, a private investigator who is already involved in a FOIA lawsuit against Richmond officials, sent council Public Information Officer Steve Skinner a records request on July 8 seeking emails mayoral candidate Michelle Mosby sent to Councilwoman Reva Trammell related to a nonprofit Mosby runs that receives public funding. His initial request covered all emails sent in 2024.
After Skinner responded with an initial cost estimate of $467.82, Stanfield narrowed the request to only apply to one email, specifying the exact date, subject line, sender and recipient of the message he was seeking.
“Since it can’t possibly take you more than a couple of minutes to pull this record and send it to me, and since it’s not conceivably covered by any sort of privilege, I hope there won’t be any charges involved,” Stanfield wrote.
Stanfield’s hope was unfounded. Skinner said the drastically narrowed request would still cost more than $200 based on “conservatively estimating the undertaking for what would be required for thoroughly searching per the request spanning the provided timeline/members/staff during that duration.”
Skinner said the final cost could end up being higher or lower. But he asked Stanfield to pay the $223.30 in advance.
On July 17, Stanfield sent another email flagging the issue for the entire City Council, saying he felt the cost was unreasonable and he couldn’t afford to pay it.
When asked about the cost estimate this week, Councilman Andreas Addison said he felt it was “excessive.”
“I literally found this email in 5 seconds in a search on my Outlook,” said Addison, who is also running for mayor and recently called for Richmond’s government to improve its FOIA compliance.
Addison sent the email in question to Stanfield Wednesday afternoon shortly after The Virginia Mercury inquired about it.
“Upon further review, this is an excessive amount of money needed to search for one email,” Addison wrote to Stanfield. “As government emails are classified as public record and information, I do not see why there is such a burden of cost.”
State Sen. Danica Roem, D-Prince William, has filed numerous bills in the General Assembly seeking to rein in excessive FOIA fees. Those efforts have not been successful.
Portsmouth flubs FOIA response on severance payments
Last month, The Virginian-Pilot used a public records request to report that the city of Portsmouth had spent nearly $900,000 on severance payments to departing employees over five years.
After the article was published, a former employee told the newspaper he had received a severance payment that wasn’t reflected in the data.
That omission led the city to acknowledge it had provided incomplete data under the original FOIA request. The city then disclosed four additional payments, raising the total to more than $1 million, according to new reporting by the Pilot.
The city called the error an “unintentional oversight,” but said it would work on purchasing a new system to keep track of FOIA requests. City officials wouldn’t explain how the current process works.
The Mercury’s efforts to track FOIA and other transparency cases in Virginia are indebted to the work of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government, a nonprofit alliance dedicated to expanding access to government records, meetings and other state and local proceedings.
Lynchburg judges deny request to release list of primary voters
In a legal battle over the validity of the election outcome in a bitter GOP primary for a Lynchburg City Council seat decided by just 33 votes, a three-judge panel denied one of the candidate’s requests to release a full list of Republican and Democratic primary voters.
According to Cardinal News, an attorney for council candidate Peter Alexander indicated the lists should be provided “to ensure that nobody who voted was actually ineligible for reasons such as being a felon.”
The attorney, Bill Hurd, also said the lists would enable observers to check whether anyone voted in both the Republican and Democratic primary, which would not be allowed under the state’s election laws.
The judges denied the request after Hurd acknowledged there was no evidence of voting by people with disqualifying felony convictions or voters casting ballots in both primaries.
The judicial panel agreed that the two parties in the suit should have access to a different list showing which primary voters requested absentee ballots.
Have you experienced local or state officials denying or delaying your FOIA request? Tell us about it: info@virginiamercury.com
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