MORGANTOWN PAPER SUING HEALTH DEPT. OVER PUBLIC INFORMATION FAILURE

(04/12/2008)

The Monongahalia County Board of Health has joined a number of other state and county agencies being sued over the violation of the state's public information laws. The Dominion Post plans to sue the county health board for refusing to release complete copies of public comments about a proposed county-wide smoking ban. Board chairman Sam Chico, III released a tally of public comments made regarding the smoking issue, but refused to provide the Morgantown newspaper with the names, addresses and telephone numbers of the people who made them. The newspaper says it wanted to confirm if the comments made were accurate. Newspaper Editor Geri Ferrara argues that the origins of the responses are key to the credibility of the tally. Public information lawsuits are in the works by a Pittsburgh paper with WVU over information related to the MBA degree issued to Governor Manchin's daughter, another with the State Supreme Court, which is claiming exemption from the state's FOIA laws. West Virginia's freedom of information law, which at one time was extolled as a national model, has been amended over 100 times by the WV legislature. The Associated Press, in a statewide survey of the 55 counties, gave F's and D's to many state and county agencies, including the West Virginia State Police and school boards.

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