The Mountain Mail (Salida):  The cost of requests made to the city of Salida under the Colorado Open Records Act, related just to the attorney fees necessary to review the requested documentation, has risen to more than $17,000 through Aug. 31.

The documentation in each CORA request must be screened by the city’s attorney to protect citizen privacy as well as privileged information.

“These costs are a concern. It would be so good if, instead of this, we could be using these monies to up the pay for our city employees,” said Mayor Jim LiVecchi.

“We struggled trying to hire police officers because the pay rate is so low. These are taxpayer-provided funds. And now we are dealing with a lawsuit which could be another $20,000.”

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