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The Wisconsin Newspaper Association's Government Update newsletter is sent monthly, alternating every two weeks with distribution of The Bulletin. |
Help WNA enlist bill co-sponsors:
Deadline is Friday, Jan. 27 | Senator Joseph Leibham (R-9) and Representative Howard Marklein (R-51) have agreed to act as the lead sponsors on a WNA legislative initiavtive that would update the newspaper legal certification process administered by the Wisconsin Department of Administration (DOA). The bill was drafted in conjunction with the DOA staff.
WNA members are asked to please support Senator Leibham and Representative Marklein's effort to assist the newspaper industry by contacting your state representative and senator and requesting that they sign-on as a co-sponsor of the legislation. The bill draft is currently being circulated for co-sponsors. Please request that your legislator sign-on to co-sponsor " LRB 3165/1 and LRB 3873/1 relating to: the typeface used, and rates charged, for publication of legal notices." Deadline to become a co-sponsor is Friday, Jan. 27. You can review the following co-sponsor memo from Senator Leibham and Representative Marklein for details on the legislation. |
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Please support WNA's efforts to amend Department of
Natural Resources' wetland and permitting legislation
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WNA is happy to report that the public notice provisions that had been eliminated from the DNR water and air emission permitting legislation have been restored to the bill. The bill as initially introduced would have allowed the DNR to post permitting notices on the department's website in lieu of publication in the newspaper. Please Provide Your Input One issue of concern remains in the revised legislation that the WNA is working aggressively to correct. Specifically, the bill as currently drafted calls for the "public notice period" to begin on the date that the public notice first appears on the DNR website and not on the date that the notice is initially published in the newspaper. The onerous language can be found in two pending proposals: Wetlands: AB 463/ SB 368 Water and Air Emissions Permitting: AB 421/ SB 326 Specifically, the proposals do not statutorily address when the notice will appear in the newspaper.As written, the proposals simply state throughout that, "the department shall publish a class 1 notice under ch.985". Currently, the timeline for public notice begins the day that the notice appears in the newspaper. If this legislation passes as drafted there will be no oversight applied to the timeline of the mandated newspaper notice. Simply stating that the notice will appear in the newspaper, without providing a statutory timeline for publication will not guarantee citizen participation. Without a timeline for publication there is no guarantee that the notice will be timely. Any citizen reading the information for the first time in the newspaper will assume that there is an implied ability to participate in the government's public comment/notice process. What happens if the newspaper notice runs too late for the interested party to react or participate? WNA Recommended Action Please call your state representative and senator and let them know that you have concerns with the existing public notice provisions contained in Wetlands: AB 463/ SB 368 and Water and also in Air Emissions Permitting: AB 421/SB326.
WNA is suggesting that the DNR amend the legislation to require that the notice be submitted to the newspaper on the date that it is posted on the DNR website.
Submitting the notice to the newspaper on the day that it appears on the DNR's website provides the department with a verifiable timeline and expectation for when the notice will appear in the newspaper.
Suggested Change to the Existing DNR language is underlined as follows:
"The department's notice to interested persons may be given through an electronic notification system established by the department. For the purpose of determining the date on which notice is provided under this subsection, the date on which the department first publishes the notice on its Internet Web site and electronically submits the Class 1 notice to the newspaper for publication shall be considered the date of the notice.
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An open meetings law advisory for WNA reporters, editors
| Madison attorney Robert J. Dreps, who serves as WNA's Legal Hotline counsel, drafted the following advisory regarding open meetings issues:
We've received several hotline calls recently about closed meetings to discuss or establish workplace rules now that "conditions of employment" is no longer a permitted subject of collective bargaining for most public employees.
We have advised that none of the current exemptions to the Open Meetings Law authorize closing a meeting for this purpose. Municipalities have cited Wis. Stat. section 19.85(1)(c), which authorizes closing a meeting for "considering employment, promotion, compensation or performance evaluation data of any public employee over which the governmental body has jurisdiction or exercises responsibility." However, this section properly applies only when the discussion concerns a specific employee, not a position in general and certainly not the workplace as a whole.
The Attorney General's Open Meetings Compliance Guide indicates "the purpose of this exemption is to protect individual employees from having their actions and abilities discussed in public," not "to protect a government body when it discusses general policies that do not involve identifying individual employees."
Before Act 10, municipalities did not have to provide notice or comply with the open meetings law when discussing this subject because it was part of collective bargaining, which has never been subject to the open meetings law. Now, the same issues must be discussed in open session because the discussion is not specific to any individual employee.
What rules should be adopted for the workplace is a subject that affects public employees, to be sure, but it is now a policy issue required to be discussed in public rather than as part of collective bargaining. The collective bargaining exemption still applies, however, to police and fire bargaining units that still have the right to bargain over conditions of employment.
Any WNA member encountering a notice claiming the right to close any meeting to discuss workplace rules in the wake of Act 10 is encouraged to call the Legal Hotline at 800-362-2664. We've had some success persuading bodies to reconsider and open these meetings.
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Your Right to Know:
Gun permit secrecy shields law's impact
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Your Right to Know is a monthly column distributed by the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council, a nonprofit group dedicated to open government. Dave Zweifel, a former council president, is editor emeritus at The Capital Times. WNA members are encouraged to run this column in their publications.
 | | Dave Zweifel |
By Dave Zweifel - Wisconsin citizens who obtain a simple permit now have the right to carry concealed weapons, in most public places. According to the governor and the majority of state legislators, that's going to make the state a safer place.
Unfortunately, though, we'll never know for sure.
That's because the Legislature saw fit to exempt the permitting process from Wisconsin's long-standing open records law. Not even law enforcement officials are allowed to routinely access the list of people who have been granted concealed carry permits.
That perplexes Doug Pettit, the village of Oregon's police chief and legislative representative for the Wisconsin Chiefs of Police Association, who tried in vain this year to get the records opened for inspection.
"I would think that the sponsors of this law would want to show proof to the public that the sky isn't falling because of concealed carry," he said. "If no one can access records, how will we ever know?"Read more >>
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Nominees sought for Opee Awards:
WFOIC will honor whistleblower, openness advocates
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The Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council, a state group (with numerous WNA-member representatives) devoted to protecting public access to meetings and records, is seeking nominees from news organizations and others for its annual Opee Awards, which are presented in March.
The Opee Awards will be presented just prior to national Sunshine Week, which this year is March 11-17. The awards are for 2011-12 and can include nominees from the first part of 2012.
In particular, the Council is seeking nominees in the relatively new category of Whistleblower of the Year. This is meant to honor a person who (or institution that) went to exceptional lengths to bring important information to public attention. The winner can remain anonymous. Last year this award went to "Concerned Citizen," the person who called the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's attention to fraud in a state childcare program, prompting a series of articles for which the paper won a Pulitzer Prize.
The council also gives annual awards in the following categories: Citizen Openness Advocate of the Year, Public Openness Advocate of the Year, Media Openness Advocate of the Year, Open Records Scoop of the Year, and No Friend of Openness Award. Nominees are also welcome for these categories.
We are asking that nominations be made by Friday, Jan. 27. Supporting documentation can but does not have to be included.
Send nominations to:
Bill Lueders
Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council
[email protected]
608-669-4712
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WISCONSIN OPENNESS REPORT
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The Wisconsin Openness Report, a compilation of newspaper coverage of Open Meetings and Freedom of Information issues from across Wisconsin, is sent to WNA members as a stand-alone e-mail.
The message contains links to allow readers to download and view PDF coverage from each newspaper listed.
Click here to sign up for The Wisconsin Openness Report, Government Update and/or Press Notes newsletters. Contact the WNA office for archive information.
Have a recent article regarding open meetings, open records or other freedom of information topics to submit to the report? Send a PDF via e-mail to [email protected].
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WISCONSIN PUBLIC NOTICES ONLINE
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 WisconsinPublicNotices.org is designed to assist citizens who want to know more about the actions of local, county and state government as well as events occurring in the local and state court system.
Search for public notices by keyword, date, newspaper or location.
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