(Editor’s note: This story was updated April 20 at 12:30 p.m.)
[T]he log of public records requests that Vermont law requires the administration to keep up to date went more than a year without updating.
As of Tuesday morning, the Department of Information and Innovation had not updated a log of requests made under the Vermont Public Records Act since March 2015.
Additionally, it appears the Shumlin administration never sent an annual report detailing such requests that was due Jan. 15. The log and the annual report to the Legislature are required under state law, according to the secretary of state’s office.
The annual report was required beginning in 2006, according to that office’s website, and the database has been required since 2011, under a law spearheaded by Gov. Peter Shumlin.
Did you know #Vermont agencies are required to log #VTPublicRecords requests? #vtpoli https://t.co/CV3uNVIvlw pic.twitter.com/E7d0RuwAai
— VT State Archives (@VTStateArchives) February 2, 2016
However, the administration says the report is no longer required.
The 2016 reports to the Legislature are not listed on the websites of the House and Senate Government Operations committees, and they’re not included on the legislative website’s page that lists reports submitted in 2016.
In the Department of Information and Innovation’s database, the records requests that were listed Tuesday morning mostly sought documents from the Department of Public Safety, and they included requests from Jan. 2, 2013, to March 15, 2015.
The information was also largely inconsistent, including a Jan. 27, 2015, request from VTDigger in which the entry lists only the requestor’s first name. A majority of the requests do not list the dollar amount charged for producing the public records, and most say it took a half hour to produce the documents.
Under the Vermont Public Records Act, the state cannot charge for producing the documents if it takes workers less than half an hour. However, the database says the state regularly charged $20 for requests that took a half hour and once charged as much as $45 to produce records that took a half hour.
Public records requests to the governor’s office are generally handled by Sarah London, Shumlin’s lawyer. She said Friday she thought the database replaces the need for the legislative report. She then directed VTDigger to speak with the Agency of Administration.
On Monday, Deputy Administration Secretary Michael Clasen referred VTDigger to Harry Bell at the Department of Information and Innovation. Bell said he thought the administration updates the database quarterly on a voluntary basis.
Upon learning of state statute requiring updates — and that the database hadn’t been updated since March 2015 — Bell offered to update it as soon as possible. As of Tuesday afternoon, the database showed requests through Dec. 31.
Tanya Marshall, the state’s archivist, said in an email she had “little evidence that agencies have been complying with the requirements to record in this system and have not seen a report from the Agency of Administration related to (the requirements) in quite some time.”
Justin Johnson, the secretary of the Agency of Administration, said Tuesday afternoon he thought the online log doubled as the report to the Legislature.
Wednesday morning, Clasen and London said the requirement for the administration to submit annual reports was repealed in 2014 under Act 142.
Jim Condos, the secretary of state, said the requirement may have been repealed, but nobody told his office, and he would need to do further research to verify.
