Yes!Weekly's push-back back against City secrecy

GREENSBORO, NC -- As the City of Greensboro sets down new policies for access to public records, including a good going over by the police of records requests and police sign-off before documents are released, a Yes! Weekly editorial tells a cautionary tale of the time a city tried to keep documents from the view of Yes! sister publication, The Outer Banks Sentinel. The city lost.

"It applies in the here and now as Greensboro officials attempt to revamp the city’s process for public-information requests. Let it serve as a warning to the crafters of the new policy that the law is on the side of the people when it comes to public records, that denying them can be costly and embarrassing, and that newspaper like ours are relentless in our pursuit of the truth."

— Yes! Weekly

City's new records policies: New bureaucracy, police approval, new fees

GREENSBORO, NC -- The City of Greensboro is about to clinch an iron fist around its records. City staff is recommending or has already implemented the following as changes to how it handles public records requests according to documents:

- Police now review all records requests.
- Police must now sign-off on records before they are released.
- Multiple layers of bureaucratic review that will include individual departments, the police, the legal department and the City Manager's office.
- Fees for "processing large requests" (this almost certain to be unlawful)

Not surprisingly, these recommendations have been made and implemented without one iota of public input.

City council remains silent.

Bill would make withholding public records a crime

This is long overdue. North Carolina public records law is flouted without consequences in Greensboro and the people's representatives, our city council, are apathetic. It's time citizens have an avenue other than law suits and indifferent representatives to rectify unlawful secrecy.

"Officials who refuse to release public records or shut North Carolina residents out of open meetings could face criminal penalties under a bill filed Thursday.

"Senate Bill 125 would make violations of the state public records and open meetings laws a Class 3 misdemeanor. State Sen. Buck Newton, a Wilson Republican, is co-sponsor of the bill introduced by Sens. Thom Goolsby and Tom Tom Apodaca." — The Wilson Times

[Hyperlinks added to quotation.]

Police now first step in Greensboro records request process, City Council informed

GREENSBORO, NC --

"We have made immediate adjustments to our process to ensure that the Greensboro Police Department is now the first step in the email/public information review process."-- Email from City Manager Denise Turner Roth to all Greensboro City Council representatives, January 30, 2013

No public reaction to this by any city council people. I guess they are okay with it.

Good question about DGI

GREENSBORO, NC -- Eric Robert, downtown property owner and restorer, writes this about Downtown Greensboro Incorporated, the downtown advocacy group that city council has decided to reevaluate.

"Technicalities, half truths and nuances too often veil real intentions. As a downtown property owner, I am a reluctant contributor to our current center city administrators, Downtown Greensboro Improvement Corporation dba Downtown Greensboro Inc, aka, Downtown Greensboro Foundation: a 501C3, a 501C4 and a 501C6; Three distinct entities with common officers and membership, specifically engineered to circumvent typical non profit limitations and public scrutiny. For example, a 501 C4 is not allowed to carry on propaganda or influence legislations…well, DGI sure is carrying on about the GPAC and certainly has influenced many legislations and ordinances… the upcoming “good repair “ ordinance was originally redacted by DGI …what DGIC is not permitted to do as a 501 C4 can be legally accomplished as a 501 C6, or a 501 C3. It is legal but is it ethical?"

Robert has more to say about downtown in his remarks.

Greensboro City Attorney buffaloes council, public

GREENSBORO, NC -- At last night's city council meeting, Mayor Robbie Perkins recognized city staff for a period of speeches not, for some reason, on the agenda. (The public is allowed to speak on agenda items, so maybe that inconvenience was to be avoided.)

The City Manager, Police Chief and City Attorney Mujeeb Shah-Kahn spoke, each taking on a slice of the controversy surrounding the recent Yes!Weekly police surveillance story and the failed attempt by the city to stop Yes! from publishing its story.

Shah-Kahn's presentation was less than genuine.

Deception #1

"The city did not wish to prevent a media outlet from publishing, rather the City sought delay so that it could determine what information had been disclosed and take steps to protect those citizen involved." -- Mujeeb Shah-Kahn, Greensboro City Attorney*

That the City only sought "delay" is false.

As the complaint filed by the City with the court clearly states, the City sought from the Court "an Order permanently restraining and enjoining Defendants from using, publishing, disseminating, or otherwise releasing said criminal intelligence information to the public."

"Permanently."

Shah-Khan told City Council and the public that the City only wanted to delay publication. That explanation does not align with the actions the City undertook,

Deception #2:

"Some have suggested that the City requested a restraining order to protect the police department from having its lawful criminal intelligence activities from being disclosed to the public. That is not the case. The city's goal was to protect the citizens named in those documents from harm." -- Mujeeb Shah-Kahn, Greensboro City Attorney*

The city's own court filings say that one of the reasons it sought a temporary restraining order was because the emails provided to Yes! contained "confidential" information including: "Methodologies of gathering information not generally known to the public" which, if released, the City contended, would "significantly impair or impede the ability of the Greensboro's law enforcement [sic] to anticipate, prevent, or monitor possible violations of law."

Shah-Kahn told City Council and the public that the City was not trying to keep secret police intelligence activities. That explaination does not align with the pleading the city made to the Court.

Deception #3:

"The city did not wish to prevent a media outlet from publishing, rather the City sought delay so that it could determine what information had been disclosed and take steps to protect those citizen involved." -- Mujeeb Shah-Kahn, Greensboro City Attorney

Yes, there are two deceptions here. The second is in Shah-Kahn claiming that the city needed a restraining order to determine what had been disclosed. Just a minute earlier, he said that the city needed to persue a restraining order precisely because it already knew what had been released.

"[M]y office sought a temporary restraining order from Judge Ronald Spivey to delay the publication of the story by Yes!Weekly which the the city understood would disclose the identity of confidential informants and disclose criminal investigative information obtained by the city."

"... [I]t was clear that sensitive information had been released inadvertently and there was the possibility that publication of this information could create the risk of serious injury or death." -- Mujeeb Shah-Kahn, Greensboro City Attorney

So, which is it? Did the City seek to restrain Yes!Weekly's publication because it knew what information had been released or because it needed to determine what information had been released?  Shah-Khan is at odds with himself and cannot be correct on both counts.


* All quotations from Mr. Shah-Khan herein are from the February 19, 2013 city council meeting (video here, comments start at 26:45)

City Manager reiterates commitment to transparency

"We remain committed to providing public records to the public as quickly and as efficiently as possible. We will not let process become an excuse for delaying access to public records, and I can't emphasize that enough." -- Greensboro City Manager Denise Turner Roth, February 19, 2013 City Council Meeting

"Please provide me all records of any communications in any form from January 23, 2013 through today, inclusive, regarding Yes!Weekly, including but not limited to any records documenting discussion options for or attempts to restrain the paper's distribution." -- Roch Smith, Jr, January 30, 2013.

My request above of 21 days ago remains unfilled. The last communication I received about it said I should get the requested information today.

I have also asked for information about the "internal team" set up to review the City's response to public records requests without, apparently, any citizen input. That unfilled request was made 9 days ago.

Good job Channel 13

GREENSBORO, NC -- I commonly write about my perceived failings and shortcomings of local government. I worry sometimes that it may seem as if I'm sour on government employees. I'm not. I cringe when I see people turn what should be policy corrections or a need for action into personal battles. Believe me, I understand, when governmental workers are unresponsive or worse, deceptive, there is a great temptation to call that person out -- and maybe, after a point, they deserve it.

Nonetheless, I cannot be a critic of local government without also observing the good things it does and let's face it, while we are falling down on some important stuff at the moment, our fair city does get a lot right.

One of the good things is the video taping of City Council meetings. The folks (or person) running the show know who people are and understand the undercurrents and friction points of current topics. The result is lively coverage of meetings where reaction shots of involved people are interspersed with shots of the current speaker. Someone is doing more than just showing up. They are paying attention and it's noticeable in a superior production.

City's snow job

GREENSBORO, NC -- In response to the Yes!Weekly story on Greensboro Police surveillance (that the City of Greensboro attempted, unsuccessfully, to stop from seeing the light of day by suing for an injunction), the News & Record's Doug Clark wrote an editorial in which he called the events "bizarre and disturbing." He came to this conclusion:

"The City Council must demand a full accounting of police surveillance policies and activities — not about their tracking of criminals but of citizens who are exercising their constitutional rights."

The City Council has remained mum on the matter, but top city staff countered with an opinion piece of their own a few days later. It was authored by the City Manager Denise Turner Roth, Chief of Police Ken Miller and the City Attorney Mujeeb Shah-Kahn.

Let's look at the meat of their response and expose it for the snow job it is, shall we?

"[Doug Clark's] editorial suggests police investigative practices are suspect and in need of oversight. Actually, multiple mechanisms exist to ensure high integrity of criminal and internal investigative processes"

They write "multiple mechanisms" but identify only two. Let's take the second one first.

"The department also conducts a community survey to receive feedback critical to the calibration of its performance."

This survey, conducted by telephone of 401 people in May of 2011, asked people their impressions of the GPD (see it here). Sure, it's not unimportant to sample the community's impressions, but this doesn't address surveillance policies or activities at all. Surveillance isn't even mentioned once. Although city staff put forth this survey as germane, it is irrelevant—a red herring. It doesn't address surveillance.

The other of the two "multiple mechanisms" the city's top dogs describe like this:

"[T]he department is nationally accredited since 1985 and earned special recognition in 2011. This process examines and validates the effectiveness of all policies, standards and practices. It produces and publicly shares an annual report that describes all facets of how the department polices itself, including an analysis of data to inform revisions to policy, procedure and training."

There is only one of these reports, from 2011 (see it here). Despite the claims of city staff, it does not examine or validate the effectiveness of "all" policies, standards and practices. It does not address surveillance activities or policies, the very issue under discussion.

The vast majority of this report covers how the police department handles complaints against the police. It also offers some interesting statistics about the frequency of police use of force, use of weapons and vehicle pursuits, but surveillance? No. The word "surveillance" is only even mentioned once, as a category of reason for use of force. The report does not address surveillance policy or activities. It's just not there. This is another red herring.

So of the two mechanisms the City Manager, Attorney and Police Chief held up to the citizens of Greensboro to reassure us that police surveillance activities and policies are on the up and up, neither addresses police surveillance activities or policies.

I don't know if the writers missed the point of the editorial to which they were responding or if they intentionally set about to placate people by citing irrelevant reports. Either way, the fact remains, the City has not come forth with an accounting of the city's surveillance policies and activities that Clark and recent events rightly demand. A snow job by the City's top staff in response is even more reason for City Council to take the reins.

Records contradict top city staff

GREENSBORO, NC -- In an opinion piece published in the News & Record and written by Greensboro City Manager Denise Turner Roth, Police Chief Ken Miller and City Attorney Mujeeb Shah-Kahn, defending the city's surveillance of law-abiding citizens, they wrote:

"[M]ultiple mechanisms exist to ensure high integrity of criminal and internal investigative processes. First, the department is nationally accredited since 1985 and earned special recognition in 2011. This process examines and validates the effectiveness of all policies, standards and practices. It produces and publicly shares an annual report that describes all facets of how the department polices itself, including an analysis of data to inform revisions to policy, procedure and training."

That sounds reassuring—a process of accreditation since 1985 that results in a publicly available annual report.

So I asked for the last three of those annual reports.

I received one internal report for 2011. When I asked for the others, this was the reply:

"The 2011 PSD Report is the first year of that report."

The opinion piece was deficient to begin with in sidestepping the issue at hand, which is accountability to the public of police surveillance of law-abiding citizens, now we learn that it was also misleading.

Where is city council on this and other issues of our civil liberties? Missing in action.

[Updated: 2:17 P.M. corrected Turner Roth's name.]

Hammer's big lie

"Last week we reported that Greensboro had given out confidential police reports to Yes! Weekly." -- John Hammer, Rhinoceros Times 

"Information that falls under the criminal investigation or criminal intelligence exception to the public records law is not public record, but it is not confidential." Frayda S. Bluestein, North Carolina School of Government, to Ben Holder.

As he is so very good at, Rhino Times editor and publisher John Hammer has begun constructing a narrative through his tried and true tactic of the firm and steady repetition of a claim he never bothered to explain or substantiate in the first place.

This time, Hammer is attempting to implant the notion in the public conciousness that the emails released by the City of Greensboro to his competitor Yes!Weekly were "confidential." (From here, it's an easy slide into Hammer's favorite past time of berating city staff as incompetent, which seems to be his real objective.)

One problem: The records are not "confidential." (They are not "reports" either, as Hammer says. They were emails. "Confidential police reports," sounds more sinister, I suppose, but it was emails that were released, not reports and Hammer surely knows that.)

As Frayda Bluestein of the North Carolina School of Government explains, courtesy of Ben Holder, "confidential" has a specific meaning in regard to government records and the documents to which Hammer is referring don't meet the test.

City employees, even police, cannot simply slap the word "confidential" on an email and make it off limits. These records fall into the area where cities have some discretion about their release. The records the City released are of the kind that Bluestein explains:

"[T]he statute leaves it to the public agency to decide whether and when to release this type of material."

The city legally released this information. It offered a glimpse of the way local police conduct surveillance on law-abiding citizens and revealed that at least one police lieutenant considered a city council person to be a "confidential informant."

I would argue that it's good for civilians to have this kind of insight into their police force and elected representatives. Others may disagree, but it's a big lie to express that disagreement by pretending that that such records are "confidential." They are not and Hammer should stop saying they are. He's misleading his readers.

Yes!Weekly: Emails appear to contradict Council representative, city leadership

GREENSBORO, NC -- Yes!Weekly has made available some of the emails that were the foundation for their story Under surveillance which led to a  failed attempt by the City of Greensboro to get an injunction to stop publication of that story and a subsequent attempt to justify that action in an opinion piece co-authored by the City's manager, police chief and attorney.

Yes!'s Eric Ginsberg writes:

"Read the files on Abuzuaiter here, including the e-mails Abuzuaiter claimed she did not send. The councilwoman denied all correspondence with Detective Rob Finch, and also said she never communicated with Capt. John Wolfe about the Beloved Community Center or Latin Kings."

Ginsberg also says the emails call into question whether the city's explanation of its attempts to stop the publication of the article were for the reasons they gave to the public or if the attempt at an injunction was to protect the councilwoman.

Privatization of Guilford health services cuts availability of psychiatric medications

GREENSBORO, NC -- From Michele Forrest in the comments at Ed Cone's blog:

"Monarch, which contracted with Sandhills to provide mental health services in Greensboro, is not offering financial assistance with psych meds. Previously, Guilford Center offered meds at lower prices and provided free meds for homeless people (and maybe others, as well -- it was based on income).

Our StreetWatch team is finding that some homeless people are now going without medicine for bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, PTSD, depression and other mental illnesses that can result in them harming themselves or others, and/or engaging in other criminal behavior. This is a serious problem. From a cost/benefit perspective, it's less expensive to subsidize meds than to pay for jail beds. And it's inhumane to allow mentally ill people to suffer because they're poor."

Are our County Commissioners going to wait until someone goes off and hurts somebody before addressing this problem? Probably. 

UPDATE: News & Record's Joe Killian reports, Jail trying to cope with mentally ill

Local CEO pulls up short in national debt critique

GREENSBORO, NC -- Tonya Martin Cockman, CEO of Greensboro company ClearDefense LLC writes a guest blog post at the Triad Business Journal about what she calls, "the unsustainable trajectory" of our national debt. Cockman serves on  the N.C. Steering Committee of the Campaign to Fix the Debt a committee of wealthy people who have theirs and have volunteered to tell the rest of us what we are going to have to forego to fix a problem that many of them had a hand in creating (to the extent that it is a problem, which is debatable).

Not surprisingly, Cockman advises that part of the remedy will be spending cuts and she specifically mentions "entitlement programs" (i.e., Social Security and Medicare). While Cockman avoids taking partisan sides by also calling for tax increases, there's one area that she side-steps: cuts to the Military.

In 2011, the last year for which data is available, Cockman's company received 11 defense contracts worth a  total of $1.1 million. I don't know why it bothers me when people benefiting from government largess propose to tell other people to expect less from their government, but it does.

Good news; Greensboro moves forward on public records review

Ben Holder reports that the City of Greensboro has assembled a team to review the City's public records request response system.

That is good news indeed. I look forward to the inclusion of public participation and to the mayor appointing a council liaison to the team.

How well is City Council looking out for our civil liberties?

GREENSBORO, NC -- How active a role are our Greensboro City Council representatives taking in looking out for our civil liberties? The Greensboro Police department has undertaken an effort to establish a regional DNA database with a private company through which they will share DNA with other area law enforcement agencies.

Have any of our city council people thought about the need for any citizen oversight of this endeavor? I made the following records request of the city. It will be interesting to see if City Council has had any involvement.

The News & Record reported on February 7, 2013 that "The [Greensboro] police department and other area law enforcement agencies are about to build a regional DNA database with the help of a privately owned Burlington lab company."

Please provide me with any and all communications in any form between any city employees and/or city council representatives regarding:

1. Procedures for the collection, distribution and sharing of DNA.
2. Policies governing the operation of this database and the police department's participation in this effort.
3. Discussion or mention of the legalities and/or laws governing this effort.

Thank you in advance.

Records request

I submitted the following records request to the City of Greensboro:

In a column published in the News & Record on February 9th, 2013, city staff refer to:

"... an annual report that describes all facets of how the department polices itself, including an analysis of data to inform revisions to policy, procedure and training."

Please provide me with a copy of each of the last three of those annual reports.

and "...a community survey to receive feedback critical to the calibration of its performance."

Please provide me with the latest of those surveys including all responses received to it.

A simple question for the News & Record

GREENSBORO, NC -- What kind of professional standards allow the News & Record to keep an incorrect story posted online without comment or correction? It's not that the facts are in dispute or that there is a difference of opinion. The News & Record reported something that is flat out wrong—demonstrably empirically wrong—and they are letting the error stand.

From the article Transcript in Greensboro police chief’s firing now public:

"Seven years after former City Manager Mitchell Johnson placed then-police Chief David Wray on administrative leave, a transcript of their meeting has become public as part of Wray’s discrimination lawsuit against the city."

That's simply not accurate. The transcript was released in 2007, as reported then by WXII, WFMY and the News & Record itself—by a reporter who is now the N&R's government editor.

Credibility is not an empty buzzword. When people talk about the News & Record not having it, that's not a meaningless taunt, it is a genuinely deserved assessment because they do stuff like this with, seemingly, no awareness or concern.

The sad, sad irony of Grits Gauger's Sunday editorial

After a week in which the City of Greensboro attempted to stop the publication of local weekly newspaper Yes!Weekly;

After a week in which it was revealed that the Greensboro Police Department was spying on peaceful groups with an assist from a City Council representative;

After a week in which one of his reporters and, presumably he, as editor, published a story stupendously wrong on its central fact;

After a week in which said story remained uncorrected and unaddressed;

After a week which the reporter deleted comments about the inaccurate story from her Facebook page and comments on the story itself were out-of-order;

After a week when his paper's lack of response to the mistake became the target of well deserved mockery, what does the News & Record editor Grits Gauger write about for his Sunday column?

Misinformation on the web regarding the Sandy Hook School shootings.

Gauger's complaint:

"It [the web] also has provided a virtual ecosystem where facts may be trampled by the gullible, manipulative and crass."

Gauger is rolling around in a shit-stained bed, deaf to complaints about his paper's reportage, blind to substantive local issues and, instead of changing the sheets, is pointing fingers at bogey men for trampling the facts.

How rich. How sad.

"Based on their facebook page?"

News & Record reporter Travis Fain tweets:

Based on their facebook page, these guys were just openly running a $$ poker game at a bar near #UNCG http://t.co/NEkKy2qw #gso

That's some fine investigation there. Far superior to traveling the 1.3 miles from the paper's office to the open-to-the-public gambling parlor any time during the four months it had been open prior to last night's raid and actually reporting on their activities.

But, you know, Facebook!

Flushing credibility

Ben Holder on a News & Record reporter deleting his questions about a wildly inaccurate story that remains uncorrected and unaddressed:

I went back and checked yesterday and learned that my comment about her inaccurate reporting was no longer even there.  I went back today and checked and guess what?  Still nothing.  It appears that Amanda has deleted my comment from her Facebook page.  I was kinda surprised.  I would expect this from Tony Carmany, Robbie Perkins, Zach or Nancy Vaughan.  But, a reporter? 

This is bad because we need a real press.  We need a real press especially when we don't have a real council or a real city managers office or a real police force.  We need reporters to report facts because our leaders embrace lies.

We need reporters that have a sense of responsibility to their readers.  We need reporters that are bothered if they get something wrong.  We need reporters that feel a need to correct mistakes.  We don't need reporters that refuse to acknowledge their own journalistic shortcomings.

This was a simple, honest mistake made by ignorant media personalities and council members.  A simple oops woulda been acceptable.  It would have been forgotten.   What is not acceptable is arrogantly ignoring mistakes and deleting comments.  That will not be forgotten. 

Ben's right. For all the hope that new ownership at the New & Record may portend computer upgrades and more staffing, none of that matters if the people there don't now how to or don't care about restoring credibility.

Greensboro 101 apologies

In an attempt to curate spam out of the feeds to Greensboro 101, I applied some filters that were too strict. They ended up blocking feeds from the good folks at Greensboro Sports and other Greensboro related news and posts. I apologize.

I think I've fixed the problem and you should have all the chewy local goodness back at your disposal now.

Beauty

Full screen and headphones recommended.


Winds of Autumn from Hervé Demers on Vimeo.

Silence of the lambs

GREENSBORO, NC -- Have any of the local media (News & Record, WFMY and WGHP) who breathlessly and mistakenly reported the released-in-2007 police chief/city manager transcript as newly-released this week made any corrections? Have any of them walked back their implications that this will either: a) add to the mystery or b) end the mystery?

Of course, what their readers and viewers are really owed is a correction of the same magnitude and the same reach as the original error, but have any even uttered a whisper of a correction?

Grits?
Clinkingbeard?
Koutsky?
Lehmert?
Flash mob?
Jones?
Mickens?
Rivera?

Anybody going to show us how the pros do it? Baaaa -aaaaa -- aaaaa.

[update: 11:42, corrected Jones' name.]

Dear John Hammer, for Jerry Bledsoe's sake...

Dear John Hammer,

The most important local news reporting of the last decade was the Jerry Bledsoe series Cops in Black and White published in your Rhino Times. Even today, it remains an important touchstone as the inept local media remain unable or unwilling to handle the relevant facts.

I've publicly appealed to local reporters to read Bledsoe's series if they are going to venture into this subject. There's just one problem, other than an index of the first 25 chapters at Ed Cone's blog, there is no other consolidated means of navigating the series.

This is an inconvenience to us, the public, and a disservice to Jerry Bledsoe. His legacy deserves a more respecful treatment. He did a great service for the people of Greensboro and his work product deserves greater veneration than you've afforded it.

Will you please create and publicize a complete index of links to all of the chapters of the Cops in Black and White series?

Thanks,

Roch

Local reporters' reading assignment

Dear local media people,

I have a request.

If you are going to report on the events and controversies surrounding the Greensboro Police Department under the command of former Chief David Wray, will you please read Jerry Bledsoe's series Cops in Black and White?

Please?

Yes, I know it's long and I know it was published by a competitor, but it is the ultimate guide to the issue and familiariity with it would keep you from such inaccurate things as:

Amanda Lehmert of the News & Record reporting that a transcript of the conversation where former City Manager Mitch Johnson locks the Cheif out of his office as newly released when it has been available for almost six years.

Brandon Jacobs of Fox8 News following Amanda's lead and describing the transcript as "newly-released."

Mark "Flash Mob" Geary (2:15 mark), describing the years-old transcript as a "new revelation" and saying it has Mitchel Johnson referring to the "Secret Police Unit" when locking Wray out of his office (heck, Geary could have just read the transcript carefully to see that wasn't so). Geary also insinuates that the RMA report has not been made public and otherwise generally mangles the facts.

Tanya Rivera describing (0:02 mark) "Greensboro's black book scandal" as "still a mystery." (To her, perhaps.)

Here are the first 25 parts of the Bledsoe series, you'll have to Google the rest, but please do.

Thanks,

Roch

An open letter to Greensboro City Council

GREENSBORO, NC -- There is a theme quickly coming into focus about the current Greensboro city council: that they are not very good exerting management when they need to over city policies, especially those that might affect the civil liberties of Greensboro's citizens. No directives on public records, no directives on surveillance, no procedures for handling complaints against top-city staff, and now, it appears, no control of what the police may do with DNA it collects from Greensboro's citizens.

The following has been submitted to the Greensboro city council:
--------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Mr. Mayor and City Council.

The News & Record reports today of the Greensboro Police Department about to build a "regional DNA database," through the use of a private company. I have some questions:

Has the city council made themselves aware of what laws or policies may govern the collection, storage, sharing and disposition of DNA collected from Greensboro citizens by the police for this database?

The State of North Carolina has laws strictly governing the handling of DNA collected for the state lab that address some of these matters, but Travis Fain, author of the News & Record article tells me that local law enforcement is of the opinion that those provisions only apply to the state lab.

With that in mind:

1. What laws or policies will guide the circumstances under which the Greensboro Police collect DNA for use in their regional database?
2. With whom and for what purposes may it be shared? Has the city examined and found acceptable the laws or policies governing the handling of DNA at agencies with which the Greensboro Police may share DNA?
3. Is the private lab free to use DNA provided to it for other purposes? Can it share or otherwise use the DNA of Greensboro citizens for its own purposes? If not, what measures, if any, have been put into place to compel the private lab to handle DNA collected from Greensboro citizens in a manner that comports with our expectations?
4. State law provides for specific notification be made to people who are having their DNA put into the State database. Are their any provisions governing such notification by the Greensboro Police when they collect DNA for their database?
5. State law provides for specific means by which people may have their DNA expunged from the state database. Are there procedures, laws or policies in place to govern expunction from the regional database? Is the private lab bound by these provisions?

I'm sure I don't need to tell you the importance of this matter. DNA is not just a better fingerprint. It is our blueprint, our complete physical being in a digital record. Posession and use of it have implications far beyond simple identity. It can be used to make predictions about our health, develop medicinal treatments and trace our ancestry. Has the City of Greensboro taken the steps necessary to confidently assure its citizens that DNA collected from them will not be missused?

I look forward to hearing your answers to these questions.

Sincerely,
Roch Smith, Jr.

But, he said so. News & Record fails to fact check

GREENSBORO, NC -- In touting a new regional DNA database in which the Greensboro Police Department is participating, the News & Record quotes the president of the private contractor:

DNA:SI President Richard Clark said agencies using the system see "a 10 to 15, 20 percent decrease in crime in the first year."

Sounds great. Is it true? The reporter doesn't cite any facts, but what the heck, the guy says so, right?

Greensboro media stricken with mass amnesia, blunderfest ensues

[Editor's note: The word "report" is used in this post. It is not always intended to mean researching, investigating and conveying facts or anything like the traditional meaning of the word "report." In some instances, it is used to describe a charade, the way one would describe children in pirate costumes as "sword fighting" at Halloween. They think that's what they are doing, it sort of looks like that's what they are doing, but that's not what they are doing. You know, "reporting."]

GREENSBORO, NC -- I can't stop laughing.

Apparently kicked off by a report in the News & Record, Greensboro's media jumped all over the newly-released transcripts of a recording of former city manager Mitchel Johnson firing former police chief David Wray in 2006.

One minor detail though: The transcripts were released six years ago.

Under the original headline "Transcript in Greensboro police scandal now public," (since changed), the News & Record reported (emphasis added):

"It was a meeting that had ripple effects across city government.

"It led to a police chief resigning, a city manager being fired and several new politicians being elected into office.

"And now, the details of that closed-door meeting are open for public review."

WGHP rushed in to report (emphasis added):

"Seventeen pages of newly-released transcripts read like a never-ending saga"

Cut to City Council representative Zack Matheny:

"It's finally, at this point, seven years later, coming out to what actually happened."

Cut to City Council representative Marikay Abuzuaiter:

"Once I review the information am I going to change any personal feelings I may have had in the past? That's going to be huge for me, that's going to be a huge informational overload that I am going to have to filter through."

Not to be left out, WFMY jumped on the goofwagon and reported:

"A transcript of that 'private' conversation is now public."

WFMY's accompanying video has been removed without comment is back online. In it, a reporter describes the transcripts as "new revelations."

Then, just when everyone was having so much fun, along comes Ben Holder to spoil the blunderfest by reminding us that this "new" information was released six years ago. He posts video of the City Council approving release of the information on September 17, 2007 and of WXII reporting on it two days later:



WFMY report of the release in 2007 too:

Council Releases Audio Conversation Between Johnson and Wray
WFMY News 2
Sep 19, 2007

Most sad though is that the progenitor of this week's mass amnesia, the News & Record, had also covered the original release of this information in 2007 but this somehow eluded them this week even though the original reporter still works at the News & Record:

Wray Lockout Transcript Released
News & Record, by Margaret Moffett Banks
September 19, 2007

.

City Council as managers and Charles Cherry's good question

GREENSBORO, NC -- Somewhere between micromanaging and hands-off there is the sweet spot where our elected city council representatives must assert themselves as managers. I don't think they have found it. Their failure to assert their campaign promises of transparency and open government is one area where council needs to exert more control over city policy.

Here's another:

Although he is a thorn in the side of city government, former Greensboro police captain Charles Cherry asked a good question at last night's city council meeting that deserves an answer regardless of who is asking. It was, essentially, this:

Who investigates complaints against the upper managers of city government over whom there are no other city employees?

It's a good question.

Here's what happened as Cherry tried to get that question answered during last night's city council meeting (video, begins at 01:09:10):

Mayor Robbie Perkins responded, "Alright, we're not going to solve this tonight."

Cherry persisted, demanding to know who has the authority to initiate investigations of complaints against top-level city employees.

Mayor pro-tem Yvonne Johnson offered, "The council could. The council has the power to do so."

Cherry: "So why has that not happened when you have several legitimate complaints, written and stamped as received by you that have not been answered?"

Johnson: "I'm not the mayor, I'm just one person and nobody...

Mayor Perkins: "Mr. Cherry, thank you."

And it was over.

The particulars of Cherry's complaints not withstanding, this is the kind of thing for which council should develop a clear and public procedure. What is the process for initiating a complaint against the City's top employees and what steps does city council take in response? There appears to be no policy currently, an abdication of council's responsibilities as the people's managers of city government.

Speaking to city council on censorship

GREENSBORO, NC -- Last night, I was not joined by Yes!Weekly publisher Charles Womack to speak out against the City of Greensboro's preposterous attempts to censor his newspaper and we did not address the city council during speakers from the floor. I did though.

Here is the text of my remarks (hyperlinks added):

Honorable Mr. Mayor and City Council,

My name is Roch Smith, Jr. I built and operate Greensboro101.com, a website that collects and links to the latest news, blogs, tweets and videos from the people of Greensboro.

Last week the City of Greensboro attempted to censor local newspaper Yes!Weekly. Police attorney Jim Clark and Police Chief Ken Miller secretly filed a lawsuit, without notifying Yes!Weekly, that attempted to get a judge to stop Yes!Weekly from publishing a story about police surveillance.

I find this action shocking. Not only was this stunt an affront to the the legal principles against prior restraint well established for decades since the Supreme Court ruled on the Pentagon Papers, it was a brutal assault on government transparency in its underlying purpose which was to hide from the public information about the police spying on law-abiding citizens. This is not the Greensboro I thought I knew. Nor is it the one in which I think we want to live.

Doug Clark, editorial writer for the News & Record described this stunt as “bizarre and disturbing.” He's right. He also said “City Council must demand a full accounting of police surveillance policies and activities." He's right about that too but this is just the latest and most disgraceful episode of a larger problem, an ongoing adversarial and overly secretive approach by the City's legal departments towards the public's right to know what our government is up to.

Since last July, I have been trying to obtain records from the city about the extent to which the City of Greensboro surveils and monitors the public at-large – those of us not suspected of any crime or evoking suspicion, but just going about our daily business. How, when, why and for whom is the City watching us? The city has successfully kept that information secret largely by citing laws intended to stop terrorism.

The citizens of Greensboro need to assert themselves, through our elected representatives, as the overseers of our local government, not its subjects or its children, and change the city's posture towards one of genuine openness and transparency and away from the kind of overreaching secrecy that has earned us the rare and appalling distinction of being a City that tried to censor a newspaper.

[The mayor interrupted here and told me to "wrap it up." I skipped the following paragraph and jumped to the last.]

The city's approach to public records is broken, more than I can describe in a mere three minutes, but I have kept city council apprised by email. So, I'm asking you, as an accompaniment to examining police surveillance policies to also take control of the City's broken approach to public records requests. Which is what got us here.

I leave it up to you to decide how best to get there, but I am asking specifically for city council to take some type of concrete action that will expeditiously result in a public, city-council approved set of directives that instruct city employees how to approach public records requests. One that reorients our city away from secrecy and confrontation and towards cooperative and real transparency. Will you please begin this undertaking as soon as possible?

Question for Yes!Weekly: City Councilor set up?

GREENSBORO, NC -- [Please see Yes!Weekly editor Brian Clarey's response below.]

There are murmurs, rumors and grumblings that Greensboro City Councilor Marikay Abuzuatier was somehow "set up" with the release by the City of Greensboro of an email from a police sergeant that identifies her as a confidential informant.

It is hard to consider these theories without quickly finding oneself wading into the most improbable of conspiracies. Nonetheless, with the release of the complaint the City filed in a failed attempt to get Yes!Weekly to stop publication of a story based, in part, on those emails, there is a bit of information that raises a legitimate question.

The complaint lists the search terms Yes! submitted for their records requests. Among them is an email address for Abuzuaiter. No other city council members' email addresses were among the search requests submitted by Yes! Just Abuzuaiter's.

Why is that?
-----------------------

Yes!'s response: Yes!Weekly editor Brian Clarey says that the search terms listed in the City's complaint were from requests made subsequent to Yes!'s receipt of documents from prior records requests in which Abuzuaiter's association with the police was first noticed. Those previous documents prompted the additional requested search specifically for Abuzuaiter's email address says Clarey.

Tone deaf

GREENSBORO, NC -- Look, I don't consider local developer Roy Carroll a villain—good for him for being a successful entrepreneur, it's not easy—but he is not very adept at reading the social and political landscapes or his place among them when he chalks up the friction he encounters as simply the "1 percent thing."

Mr. Carroll is seemingly too self-absorbed and unaware to recognize the irony of saying, "I don’t expect to be treated any differently from anybody else," after he has received millions in tax breaks from the city of Greensboro to contribute to his business success. To be among the 1 percent and not recognize the special treatment he received is pretty amazing; and more than a little galling.

Mr. Carroll also seems unaware of the incongruity of his complaining about a 75 dB noise limit downtown being too high for him to live peacefully while building homes for people at the end of the airport runways where noise levels regularly exceed 85 dB (map below, Carroll's apartments starred). 

None of this is to say that Mr. Carroll doesn't deserve his success or a liveable home (as do we all, ahem), but Mr. Carroll is wrong to think that his frustrations are merely because he is unjustly scorned as a symbolic target for the vague dissatisfaction of the hoi poloi. Mr. Carroll is playing the role of entitled rich guy better than he realizes.

Stale city website info

GREENSBORO, NC -- Why are the last minutes for the Greensboro City Council meetings to be posted online from December 4, 2012, two months ago?

There have been two meetings since then.

Black Network TV deleted my comments referring to Truth & Reconciliation Commission

North Carolina's Black Network Television posted a video to YouTube that showed up on Greensboro101 yesterday. In it, a chipper young woman describes the November 3rd, 1979 anti-Klan march in Greensboro as being a reaction to the film Birth of a Nation.

I posted a comment to the video that said, in essence, that such an explanation of the march was a disservice to the memories of those killed and the survivors who were, in fact, motivated by more complicated issues of race, class, labor and unions and for which the film was a minor and ancillary part of the story—certainly not a reason for the march that led to the tragic shootings.

In my comment, I suggested that the video makers turn to the findings of the Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission for a correct understanding of the events leading up to that day, particularly Chapter 2 of their final report that includes the section "What brought us to November 3, 1979," in which there is nothing about Birth of a Nation.

My comment was deleted without explanation.

I can only assume that Black Network Television would rather perpetuate incorrect misunderstandings than admit their mistakes. Too bad.

Here's the video:

I would like to thank the following merchants

• Domino's Pizza
• ShelfGenie
• Mattress Outlet
• Window World
• Save a lot
• Ulta Beauty
• Food Lion
• Subway
• JC Penny Optical
• Baskin Robbins
• Sunsetter Awnings
• Portrait Innovations

Thank you!

Thank you for throwing your advertisements in the yards and driveways of our neighborhood where they deteriorate and blow around like so much litter.

We appreciate it and will show it with the purchasing decisions we make.

"This is one bizarre and disturbing turn of events"

The News & Record's Doug Clark:

The City Council must demand a full accounting of police surveillance policies and activities — not about their tracking of criminals but of citizens who are exercising their constitutional rights.

Yes, but let us remember, the City is also refusing to provide information about its surveillance of the public at large—people just going about their daily business. Maybe Clark can see how the two are related and call for a broader scope.

My city just tried to censor a newspaper

The City of Greensboro attempted — and failed — to obtain a temporary restraining order against YES! Weekly on Tuesday evening to stop the distribution of information it says was accidentally given to the paper in public-information requests.  -- Yes!Weekly

GREENSBORO, NC -- Every election season, candidates for Greensboro city council talk about the importance of open and transparent government then, once elected, ignore affronts to openness and transparency.

State public records law defines some types of records as neither public nor confidential, it allows the custodian of those records discretion about whether or not to provide them to the public. When the city defines records as "police intelligence" or as "details of public security plans" in order to claim such discretion which it then exercises to keep records secret, that's not open and transparent.

The City of Greensboro reached new extremes this week though when, through the actions of City Attorney Mujeeb Shah-Khan in consultation with police Chief Ken Miller and Police Attorney Jim Clark, it attempted to exercise that discretion in a failed attempt to convince a judge to censor local newspaper Yes!Weekly.

Attempts at that kind of censorship are suitable for totalitarian dictatorships and we, as citizens of Greensboro, must firmly say, "no, you will not do that on our behalf."

It is time for Greensboro city council to intervene. It is well within the power of City Council to direct city staff to reorient their approach to government information, insisting that discretion fall to the side of openness and transparency. This latest stunt and the subsequent slap down by the judge are warning flags that the city's hunger for secrecy is a danger. It demands action.

Will city council take control or will they twiddle their thumbs? Since Mayor Robbie Perkins reportedly pushed for Shah-Khan's hire, he should take the lead, unless he likes where things are going, of course.

Pulitzer worthy

The News & Record writes a report of Yes!Weekly's report.