Hawaii FOI activities 2007
By
Stirling
Morita
Hawaii
Chapter president and Sunshine chairman
On
March 16, the Hawaii Chapter SPJ joined with seven other organizations in doing
a second records audit in which we could get state and county agency minutes
from less than 50 percent of the time. Of 55 requests made, only 25 sets of
minutes were received from 11 state and 17 county boards. Fifteen requests were
denied, four agencies misunderstood what was being asked and four needed more
information. The Hawaii Office of Information Practice also found nine of 15
denials lacked an explanation for withholding the minutes.
On March 17, I and other chapter members joined in a panel
discussion on the importance of making government records available to the
public. It was a media conference put on by the Hawaii People’s Fund.