Globe Editorial on Transparency, and Flaherty, Yoon don't respond to Public Records Requests

There is an editorial in today's Sunday Globe about the way public officials in Massachusetts ignore or disobey the Public Records Laws. By Law, officials must respond to Public Records Requests within 10 days.

The timing of today's editorial is serendipitous because just yesterday it had been 10 days since I made similar Public Records Requests to Michael Flaherty and Sam Yoon. Neither one of them has responded. It is one thing to talk about transparency, and it is another one to live up to it.

My requests are as follows:

to Michael.F.Flaherty@cityofboston.gov
cc electkevin@gmail.com
date Wed, Jan 28, 2009 at 5:49 AM
subject Constituent question and Public Records Request
mailed-by gmail.com details Jan 28 (11 days ago)


Dear Councilor Flaherty,

Thank you for your recent calls for more transparency.

1) I would like to know why you voted to change the City of Boston laws to increase the city council staff to add a position for Paul Walkowski, and increase his pay by around $20,000 above what the city had been paying him as a staff member for councilor Kelly. Can you please tell me what work he did for the city and how the city benefited by you voting to suspend the rules, and change the city laws to hire him. Why did we need to pay him 40 percent more than he had been making? What are the pension ramifications of this, as he told me this week he is retiring friday.

2) I would like to request a copy of the all paychecks of your city council staff members for the last two weeks in November, and all the weeks of December for the following years: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008.

Thank you in advance for your timely response.
Kevin McCrea

sam.yoon@cityofboston.gov
cc electkevin@gmail.com
date Wed, Jan 28, 2009 at 5:50 AM
subject Constituent question and Public Records Request
mailed-by gmail Jan 28 (11 days ago)

Dear Councilor Yoon,


Thank you for your recent calls for more transparency.

1) I would like to know why you voted to change the City of Boston laws to increase the city council staff to add a position for Paul Walkowski, and increase his pay by around $20,000 above what the city had been paying him as a staff member for councilor Kelly. Can you please tell me what work he did for the city and how the city benefited by you voting to suspend the rules, and change the city laws to hire him. Why did we need to pay him 40 percent more than he had been making? What are the pension ramifications of this, as he told me this week he is retiring friday.

2) I would like to request a copy of the all paychecks of your city council staff members for the last two weeks in November, and all the weeks of December for the following years: 2006, 2007, 2008.


Thank you in advance for your timely response.
Kevin McCrea

The reason for my public records request was to see if Councilor Flaherty or Councilor Yoon participated in giving their employees bonuses, which public sector employees are not supposed to get. The Boston Globe did a story last year about how the City Council was secretly giving pay raises beyond the prescribed salary ranges for its employees. All the councilors, including Flaherty and Yoon have been a part of this, any one of them could have stood up and said "we can't be giving raises beyond the salary ranges while our children don't have proper school supplies in our schools" and asked for a public debate, but not one of the thirteen protested.

Just like the greatness of the First Amendment is not that it protects speech that you agree with, it protects speech that you don't agree with, so too with transparency. It doesn't hold water for Sam and Michael to decry the back room deals and lack of access provided by the BRA and the Mayor and then to not obey the law themselves.