East Greenwich Schools Could Face Fines for APRA Violation

The East Greenwich School District violated the Access to Public Records Act when it brazenly ignored and failed to adequately respond to a request for the names of teachers who were given layoff notices and reported to the state for possible layoffs in the 2014-15 school year, the state Attorney General’s office has ruled.

Lisa Pinsonneault, special assistant to the attorney general, wrote in a June 12 letter that the school district “violated the APRA” and “while the school department contends the documents requested were exempt from public disclosure — an opinion that we need not reach — there is no question that even if the school department were correct in its legal conclusion, the APRA nonetheless required a response.”

The records request was filed in 2014 by MuckRock, a website that helps people file public records requests, on behalf of AccessRI, a nonprofit freedom of information coalition led by Linda Lotridge Levin, a retired University of Rhode Island professor.

Along with the teachers’ names, AccessRI wanted the district to show that employees received legally-required APRA training and that information about APRA request procedures was posted on its website.

“Such a failure has led this department to seek civil fines on numerous occasions.”

Ultimately, the district has acknowledged that employees did not receive training until late into 2014 and that the proper APRA information was not posted to its website until October of 2014. The AG’s office has concluded that those issues are fully resolved.

But what remains unresolved — and could lead to fines — is how the district handled the request for teachers’ names.

The district’s lawyer, Raymond A. Marcaccio, argued that AccessRI did not have standing in the request for teachers’ names and as a result, the district took the stance that a response was not required.

In any event, the district did finally respond with a letter dated Jan. 16 of 2015 — long after the issue was no longer pressing and the school budget had long since been adopted. And it only came in response to an instant complaint filed by Levin after months of silence on the other end of the line.

That prompted Levin’s rebuttal filed on Jan. 30 that included a complaint that the district took too long to properly respond to the initial request for information about the website and training.

In the ruling, Pinsonneault said that the district did not violate the APRA in that instance because it did respond to the initial request the following day. Though the response — an e-mail attachment consisting of a 2011 School Committee resolution adopting a policy that incorporated some APRA language — wasn’t appropriate, it was still timely.

The violation that did occur centers on the district’s flat-out refusal to acknowledge the request for teacher’s names. At its core, the ruling released Friday suggests the district needs to do some soul-searching on what its leadership team believes is public information and what is not and that all requests require a response, whether they’re deemed important or a nuisance.

The request, for a “full list of the teachers who have received layoff letters for the 2014-2015 school year, as well as the full list of teachers’ names submitted to the Rhode Island Department of Education for the possible layoff for the 2014-2015 school year,” was filed on June 27 of 2014.

Under APRA, the district had 10 days to allow the inspection or copying of the information unless they responded with a specific reason to indicate more time was needed to comply. Any explanation “must be particularlized to the specific request made,” and a public body may have up to 20 days to comply in most cases.

The school district didn’t respond until Jan. 16 of 2015 — nearly six months after the records request.

That’s “well after the timeframes set forth in the APRA,” Pinsonneault concluded.

In the end, the layoff notices became moot (In Rhode Island during budget season, it’s not uncommon for scores of teachers to get layoff notices only to end up keeping their jobs). Additionally, the website has the APRA notice and the training has been completed, so the AG’s office won’t seek injunctive relief in Superior Court.

But the district could still face fines for completely ignoring MuckRock for months. That specific act could cost the district a few thousand dollars and those exact circumstances has led the AG’s office to seek civil fines across the state “on numerous occasions,” Pinsonneault said.

“Our main concern relates to the School Department’s failure to provide a timely response. . .even though no responsive documents existed,” she wrote.

MuckRock sent followup emails on July 10, July 25, Aug. 7, Aug. 15, Aug. 20, Nov. 20, Dec. 11 and “none of these correspondences generated a response from the school department until after Access/Rhode island filed the instant complaint,” Pinsonneault said, underlining her word “none.”

“Such a failure has led this department to seek civil fines on numerous occasions.”

The district now has 10 days starting today to “provide this Department with a supplemental explanation as to why its untimely response relating to MuckRock’s June 27 2014 APRA request should not be considered a knowing and willful violation, or reckless, in light of the APRA, Supreme Court case law and this Department’s precedent.”

At the end of the period, a final decision will be made whether the district will be fined.

Read the full ruling here.