MASON CITY – The Mason City Council moved ahead with plans to authorize City Administrator Brent Trout to charge the public a fee for asking City Hall for information, sometimes called a “freedom of information” request.
Mr. Trout wants to charge for many of the requests that City staff now commonly perform at no fee. He also wants to publish the requests to the City’s website.
Mr. Trout says he got the idea of charging the public for information requests at a seminar. It seems Mr. Trout gets a lot of his ideas at seminars, as he did two years ago when he attended a “workshop” that supposedly gave advice on “handling comments” and “unfair statements” from the public posted to “new media” websites.
“I found it very interesting,” Mr. Trout wrote in a memo at the time, “and something that all public officials should be aware of.”
Most of the City Council had varying degrees of acceptance of Trout’s proposal to charge for information, with At-Large Councilman Alex Kuhn voicing the most opposition.
“The citizens are my boss,” Mr. Kuhn said Tuesday, “and I feel it is very important to have open and transparent access to the government.”
Second Ward Councilman Travis Hickey backed the idea 100%, comparing City Hall business to a McDonald’s.
“I’m in favor with chargin’ everybody,” Mr. Hickey stated.
He also said that would provide the “average citizen” a “mulligan” if they ask one question a year.
In Clear Lake, City Administrator Scott Flory said no such policy is in place.
“Generally speaking, we rarely have run into a situation where we have had to charge anyone,” Mr. Flory said. “Any interested person can look at documents at the City office for no cost and if they only want a few copies we do not charge for that service. If it was more burdensome and was going to amount to a significant amount of staff time and copying, we would charge only for our actual costs. ”
Watch the following video for Mr. Hickey’s thoughts on the matter:
So, they want to charge us for them to do the job we already pay for through taxes? OK, that’s fine, then lower the taxes we pay to compensate…
Right he removed ALL doubt for sure! He opened his mouth. The only time he should do that is to eat at Mickeys.
YES he wanted to brawl with Max at the videoed council meeting. Loser. Police had to intervine.
Duties my licked finger, Duties as a city employee or council member or any government employee are there for one thing….WE THE PEOPLE. Be it questions about your trash to ordinances to the temperature they are getting paid to ANSWER it! Public servants period. I’ve heard his dumb ass ask questions to his own council, Hick let’s charge you for that! WOW
Travis, it is better to be thought of as a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.
I believe the point Mr. Hickey should have made is that fulfilling all these requests for information may lead to needing another employee at City Hall, thus increasing the budgetary needs to run the department. Doing research for the public is not free. Yes, the employees are there to serve us, but they all have other assigned duties that they must let slide in order to do research. If they are tied up doing research for hours, their other work doesn’t get done and soon another employee is needed. When that happens because of all the research, the money is not in the budget to hire another employee, so the only source for wages would be research fees. I think the entire issue comes down to funding another full-time or part-time employee to do the research, not just soaking people who want information. I don’t think ALL the taxpayers should have to foot the bill for the few who want volumes of information or data from public offices.
While I respect your comment, I have to say we were given no numbers of how many people request, how long it takes per task, no averages on anything. So how do we know volumes of information is being requested? How do we know it takes hours to do? What if it is just a matter of hitting a key stroke on the computer and then print and then handing a paper over to the person requesting once a month? I went and read the full packed for the agenda, there was documentation on what other government agencies use this, but nothing why Mason City needs it. Before the community is charged for information that should belong to the community I think we should see if it really is that time consuming.
very good point, much of this information is at their fingertips or the click of a mouse and take less than a minute.
Peter, I agree with you. Most businesses and public offices only hire enough people to do the job at hand. When employees are tied up doing research for outside sources, it is difficult to complete all the daily work. This happened to me when I worked in a business and had to compile records for a customer’s court case. Then the judge refused to compensate our business for all the hours of research I did and all the copies we made, even though we were told we would be paid. We were short-handed during the time I had to put into the research and we couldn’t hire a temp to replace my position or to do the research. I feel a one-hour “mulligan” per year is appropriate and beyond that, all research done by a city employee should be paid research. It would be great if all the records were computerized so the public could do its own research without handling the records. I’m not sure I’d be comfortable with Joe Blow handling public records without a search before and after using the viewing library. Remember Clinton’s crony who stuffed records down his pants? I think a city employee needs to do the research until it is computerized. I think hiring someone to computerize all past and future city and county records, with hardened protection for the server, would be a great progressive idea.
Big FAT ignoramous. That’s council’s JOB! Along with tons of other reasons that’s just stupid.
Wake up all of you! Get this ass out! I was ready when he wanted to fist fight at a meeting! I’d say more brawn then brain but that would be saying he’s built. Nope he’s just a extra large sized order of burnt fries.
Didn’t McHickey try to punch out Weaver once at a meeting? Do we really need violence at our council meetings? Travis really looked ANGRY in this NIT video, like he wants to take our money any way he can even if we ask a simple question. I’m scared for Mason City right now. Draper has MY VOTE.
I think Travis of all people understands the benefits of a mulligan…. Is that not what happened for him with building a garage that was outside the scope of city code? Self Serving first, and serving the community second. I think we understand exactly who is up at the table.
Does KMART sell McMulligans?!?! Tee hee. Travis might know.
Mr. Hickey should not even open up his mouth anymore. I did not think he could sound more incompetent then he has in the past but he just proved me wrong! Wish I lived in his ward so I could cast a vote against him.
Travis has turned into such a douche!
With this kind of policy even being talked about amongst Hickey and Trout, they need to be relieved of their duties ASAP. Remember this garbage come election time, and maybe they both should find new jobs at Mickey D’s.
or they dont want the citizens to know any facts.
Matt, a positive on this is that if you request something, and offer payment for services. It would look rather embarrassing for the city not to honor the request? You are now a paying customer…..much like a stock owner at a shareholder meeting mentality, you have to get answers. Might be a good thing?
if you live in mason city (rent or own), you are already paying for it through property and sales tax. You shouldn’t have to pay TWICE!
Do these buffoons not have anythng better to do with their time than dream up this kind of garbage? This Trout fella is off his rocker. Why is it I am betting Stenchmeyer and Pornquist put him up to this?
Just another example of this mayor and council wanting to make our government more secretive. What the heck are they trying to hide? Why are they so scared the public will become aware of what they are doing? This is not government becoming more transparent to the average person. Hope the council will vote this down but I don’t have a lot of confidence in them.
I can not believe this guy is an elected official. How in the name of common sense did Travis Hickey come to believe in this kind of government?
He is not fit to hold public office!!!
I believe that omg is correct in most ways. I think that it is because of the city admin and the mayor , that the entire group along with the police chief as well as the captain are being watched and investigated. with any luck the entire group will be relieved of their duties.
FOIA, either Federal or State gives the citizen access to it’s government. And like others have said, unless you are seeking vast quantities of information, the taxpayer should not be charged.
Mr. Hickey et al need to understand they are here to serve the citizens, not the other way around.
If they really feel that we are a burden to them, remember that attitude at election time, if they feel overworked and abused they can be replaced.
You beat me to that same comment. Actually I wonder what the cost would be to replay those words on the radio at election time. at election time it will refresh the voters minds. LET THE TRUTH BE HEARD
Yes I will have fries and a soda and a sundae, please!
Well let’s put it this way. People always want to push the envelope. Always free copying, they will want something every week, day..no end to it. But one FREE per month and then pay. What’s wrong with that? That will take care of the abusers and there are always abusers.
The only problem with that would be that they would have to document and keep records of everyone that asked something throughout the year, In return making more work and wasted time for the employees.
All you need to do is investigate who is getting info for free and then offer to pay when they do. Trout and Co. are famous for “giving” to the people and groups they like…such as the downtown tax people which Ed Kent with some help beat back twice. Trout said he wanted to charge for some info I needed, cited the fact that city staff had put together the packet on the tax. Never heard another word from him.
@Arms Bears-Jodi probably doesn’t want to get involved in a pissing match. It would force her into a corner that she just doesn’t need at this time. I know she has an opinion on this and I am sure she will voice it when the time is right. Please understand, I do not speak for Jodi. She is fully capable of speaking for herself. I was very impressed with her.
LVS: Point well taken and accepted. I was just wondering. I too was equally impressed and simply wanted to extend an invitation for her to come to the party. Lol
Sample Public Records Request Letter
——————————————————————————–
[Date]
Dear [Name of government official or employee in possession of record you are seeking]:
I am requesting a copy of the following information pursuant to Iowa Code Chapter 22, the public records law.
[Detail here what records you want. Try to be as specific as possible to ensure that you receive what you are seeking. For example, “I would like copies of all correspondence between members of the city council and ABC Industries from June 10, 2012, through August 30, 2012.”]
The Iowa Attorney General’s Office advises that most requests for records are routine and should be handled immediately. Chapter 22.8 says that a reasonable delay in responding to a request shall not exceed 20 calendar days and ordinarily should not exceed 10 business days.
If there is a copying fee, please inform me in advance if the fee is more than [your upper dollar amount]. Chapter 22.3 says that the fee shall not exceed the actual cost of providing the service.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Sincerely,
[Your name and contact information]
People should learn this ACT, I think the Iowa association is inside the Journalism college at Drake Univeristy. You can access Public information made by requests. The Wallstreet Journal and locally the Des Moines Register ask and are granted information regularly.
In terms of Mason City our local paper the Globe just likes to have City Hall tell us what they want us to know.
Maybe this is why our mayor never writes emails and only has phone conversation. ? Just a thought
I wonder if City Hall will charge the Globe Gazette for information.
The idea has some merit but needs to be studied. The casual inquiry if it is not too labor intensive and s from a city resident should be free. Sometimes you get outside commercial businesses requesting lots of info for a client. More than likely they will charge that client a significant sum too. Those that make numerous requests and fail to pick them up should be monitored and charged. Anyone who requests that information should also abide by the freedom of information act and their name should be listed too.
@hacker-I have no problem charging a outside commercial business and possibly they should put a limit on how much is free. It really sounds to me like they have some employees bitching about how overworked they are. If that is true, tell them to quit. I am sure it won’t be hard to replace them on that cushy job.
What is wrong with these people?? We already pay for that service in payroll and our taxes are what pay for it. It is not like they are sitting around up there. This is what they are paid for for god’s sake. Hickey is flat out stupid and nothing but a puppet for the establishment and the mayor. Kuhn is exactly correct. We are their bosses and it is time to fire Tornquist, Hickey and Solberg.
Well spoken LVS. Trout and Hickey in particular are a french fry short of a Happy Meal.
Jodi – Would you be willing to weigh in on this topic. Please!