Free Information-More

Well.

I finally received a response to my Freedom of Information Request of August 21, 2007. (I wonder if the timing of the response has anything to yesterday's post on the subject. It was, after all, dated August 31, 2007, but only received today. Hmmm...coincidence?)

Now, before I go on, I need to make one thing absolutely clear. I do not attribute any of this baloney to our City Clerk, Lisa Kunz. She is new on the job and, having known her in her past life, I can vouch for the fact that she is a bright competent individual, a good egg. So, the following is not directed at Lisa.

No, I am convinced that this smart-ass bullsh*t goes up the line a ways. See, I guess it's shame on me. I asked for "any and all documents or other items of tangible property that identify or otherwise refer to the [City's] 'good prospects for power customers' ".

Ohhhh, I get it. The City is saying that there's nothing in writing that refers to the City's prospective power customers. This statement is either true or it's false.

If it is true, we can draw a number of conclusions from such a fact. We can conclude that the City of Great Falls is conducting negotiations on multi-year contracts worth thousands of dollars without so much as a hand-written note. We can conclude, if the statement is truthful, that there are no telephone slips, email messages, notes, memos, NOTHING that refers to any potential customer of Electric City Power.

You tell me, then, why the City would do business this way. I would posit that the only reason the City would purposely and completely eliminate any written record is to defeat the public's right to know. Is that good faith? Is that an effort to uphold the substance and intent of our Constitution?

Too, I suppose one might conclude, but cannot absolutely conclude from the information given, that there simply are no prospective customers at present.

Color me suspicious, too, that our City Clerk's bosses, in their lawyerly efforts, did not actually deny that such documents exist. They talk around the issue, but nowhere do they say "we are not producing the documents identifying the prospective customers because no such documents exist."

Consider this a reward: If anyone can produce to me, anonymously or otherwise, a City document identifying or referring to any prospective (not actual) Electric City Power customer I will pay that person $250.00 upon verifying that such document is what it purports to be.

On the other hand, the assertion that there is no written record identifying any prospective customer could be false. In fact, I know it is. Here is the City's presentation to the City of Helena. This was not produced by Ms. Kunz.

If, in fact, other documents exist that identify prospective Electric City Power customers, we are witnessing a purposeful violation of the law.

Makes you kind of proud, doesn't it?