Ford Co. (ECWd) –

If you have ever submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to a public body and wondered if the records provided truly represent everything you asked for, your concerns are valid.

As a local government accountability organization, we routinely submit FOIAs for the sole purpose of determining if the public body is going to give us the same thing they gave others, or, in some cases, actually produce records they refused to give others. In most cases, we get far more records than others seeking the same exact thing.  One example we wrote about in this article uncovered all kinds of violations of the law, which may have been the reason their original requestor was denied the records.  Public officials know the common citizen won’t push back on a denial, but as many public bodies know, we’re not the common citizen.

A FOIA request by the Ford County Chronicle to the Paxton-Buckley-Loda Community Unit School District 10 resulted in the production of 18 pages of documents, of which 8 pages were completely redacted, as can be viewed at this link.

The request: 

“Robert Pacey’s resume on file, along with any disciplinary complaints made against him during his time as a staff member and any associated reports or documents that resulted from those complaints.”

We were asked to submit an identical request because it was believed records were being withheld, which, if true, is a clear violation of the law.  Considering the level of discrepancies and the records’ content, it appears to have been a willful and intentional violation.  One could even argue it rises to the level of Official Misconduct, “Intentionally or recklessly fails to perform any mandatory duty as required by law”.

The production we obtained was 119 pages for the identical request.  Reading through them, it is clear why information was suppressed originally. A copy can be viewed at this link.  We note that we made several redactions of private phone numbers that the school failed to redact.

Was this a cover-up?  The Ford County Chronicle published this article in June, titled “Lawsuit alleges sexual misconduct by Rob Pacey, cover-up by administrators at PBL schools”.  We would love to know what the School Board knew, as they too have a responsibility with such matters.  In fact, they are the governing body for FOIA, and it is them who should be held accountable.

The superintendent referenced in that article was the person who provided the original FOIA response to the Ford County Chronicle just two months before resigning, long before his contract term.

The response to our FOIA was provided by Amy Teske, Office Manager, PBL Administrative Office.

Considering the volume of records provided to us, 119 pages, versus the measly 18 pages (8 fully redacted), provided to the local newspaper, it appears pretty clear that the Superintendent at the time did not want this information to go public.

This is just one more example of public officials’ failure to follow the law and provide the records requested to each and every person who asked for them.

Both the Ford County Chronicle and WCIA published articles on this very point, same requests, but dramatically different responses.