State auditor seeks authority to investigate tips about government fraud
Colorado’s state auditor wants statutory authority to investigate tips about kickbacks, bribes and other kinds of fraud and abuse that might occur in state government.
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State board of ed ‘politicized’ approval process for data requests, researchers and advocates say
Education researchers and advocates are worried that a newly formalized approval process will make it harder to get information needed to adequately evaluate existing K-12 programs and to recommend innovations.
Proposal calls for the destruction of old General Assembly files dating to the 1930s
The Colorado legislature’s legal staff will shred old files on each bill and amendment prepared for members of the General Assembly – some going back to the 1930s – if lawmakers approve a proposed new records retention policy.
Lawsuit: Adams Co. improperly cited ‘privilege’ in withholding emails about impounded dog
An open-records lawsuit filed this week claims that Adams County improperly withheld emails concerning the impoundment of a 6-year-old pit bull that bit a mail carrier in 2014.
Judge: School bus driver disciplinary records are public
Complaints and disciplinary actions against public school bus drivers are not “personnel” records that must be kept confidential, an Arapahoe County District Court judge ruled.
Zansberg: Why we shouldn’t hide what police body cameras show
Congress and state legislatures that provide public funds to police departments to deploy body-worn cameras should attach strings to that purse and mandate that there be a strong presumption of public access to such recordings, with only narrow, carefully defined exceptions.
CORA Working Group focuses on database records, open data, alternatives to litigation
Immediately after a bill to modernize the Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) died in a Senate committee last session, the Secretary of State’s office offered to bring stakeholders together to work on a 2017 proposal agreeable to both government entities and records requesters. That effort is well underway this summer and has focused on three main topics.
How to resolve open-government disputes without suing the government
Litigate or give up. Those are your legal options in Colorado if a government entity improperly withholds public records, charges you out-of-line fees for inspection or drags its feet on a records request. The same is true if you suspect that a public body violated the Open Meetings Law. In many other states, however, litigation is not the only way to challenge FOI denials.
Colorado Supreme Court won’t hear appeal by teachers’ union in sick-leave records case
The Colorado Supreme Court declined to review a state appeals court decision holding that sick-leave records are not part of a public school teacher’s confidential personnel file.
Is the public entitled to know how school bus drivers are disciplined?
News organizations and government-employee unions clashed in an Arapahoe County courtroom over whether the public is entitled to inspect complaints and disciplinary actions against school bus drivers.