Since I have a bit of an environmental theme going with my three previous posts this morning, let me tell you a little story about an exercise in the ridiculous and a wasted ream of paper – and the time of two or three City Staff people.
You know me, I ask questions. I like to find information on-line. Recently, I had heard a certain police officer I am not fond of was getting promoted. I wanted to look into it. So, I went and looked in legistar to find the recent minutes and agendas to see if I could see if this rumor was true. However, the Police and Fire Commission minutes were not in legistar.
My next thought was to try the “Notice of Additional Meetings” (click link at top of page) since the staff person/attorney for the Police and Fire Commission is not a city staff person and they might not have access to the programs to put information into legistar. I found two extremely uninformative (illegal?) agendas about what they may discuss that were incredibly similar, no minutes.
Then, I checked the City of Madison website to see if I could find information about the Police and Fire Commission. Nothing. All I found was a list of people on the committee and a sample of their decisions (not a comprehensive listing).
So, I called the clerk’s office. I asked where I could find the agendas and minutes of the meetings. After some looking around and trying to figure out why the information wasn’t on-line, they looked for paper. It was hit and miss available on paper but incomplete.
Then, I called the Council Office Staff, and asked Debbie to hunt it down for me. Not knowing what I would find, I asked for the minutes and agendas from the first of the year til now.
After being frustrated, I emailed the city’s web guru (yay Sarah!) and the City Attorney and inquired about why this information wasn’t available on-line or in the clerk’s office and how that agenda could be so vague. I found out that this was an issue about a year ago, memos were exchanged and nothing changed.
So, after two trips to city hall by the attorney for the Police and Fire Commission, a few heated words (not by me!) about why the staff wouldn’t say what I was looking for (they didn’t know), and some ruffled feathers that I dared to ask for information that is supposed to be available to the public, I received the information I wanted to look at. An entire ream of double sided paper. What a freaking waste! Of time and paper.
More to come, I’m certain.
