FALL 2005 NEWSLETTER
GEORGIA F.O.I. ACCESS
GEORGIA FIRST AMENDMENT FOUNDATION

With its new Open Meeting Act, Alabama stops beating a dead horse

By Tom Bennett 

     Montgomery, Ala., Sept. 29, 2005 -- Freedom of information in the South was to take a giant step forward on Oct. 1.  The  Alabama Open Meeting Act, signed by Gov. Riley earlier this year,  was to become the law of the land  in this often secret state at the heart of Dixie.  The groundbreaking law replaced a 1915 measure that shut everything down the moment any public body decided to mull anyone's "good name and character." 
   
     Rep. Blaine Gallaher of Pell City is co-sponsor of the new law.   'Teddy Roosevelt once said, 'When you discover that your horse is dead, dismount,' " Gallaher said.  "That's what we did....   It was a privilege to have had the opportunity to co-sponsor this bill.  It is one of the most rewarding pieces of legislation in my tenure." 

      The dead nag left behind not only had crushed Alabama meeting disclosure for almost a century.  It also had gotten falsely transliterated into being the records law,  too, though it never was.  That fostered the notion around the region of a "one-sentence law in Alabama that takes care of everything."  Over the years,  this myth found its way into speeches from the wells of every legislature.  It helped opponents of open-government defeat any bill with the goal of opening up anything. 
   
     Gallaher's  co-sponsor was Sen. Zeb Little of Cullman.  They wrote a comprehensive new law with real definitions.  It could transform Alabama local government.  "There are probably going to be a lot more meetings," said Dennis Bailey of Montgomery.  He is counsel for the Alabama Press Association, and could be onto something there. 

     The co-sponsors, along with the recently appointed  attorney general of Alabama,  Troy King, shared the  Ed Mullins Alabama Sunshine Award.  They were honored at the annual luncheon of the non-profit Alabama Center for Open Government.  It was held at the Retirement Systems of Alabama Terrace near the state capitol building. 

     "We've heard all this talk about accountability," said Troy King.  "Well, none of it makes a difference if people can't see what's happening in their government."  His first act as attorney general in March 2005, he said, was to write an op-ed  article for newspapers as part of this year's "Sunshine Sunday" nationwide emphasis of FOI. 

     Gregory Enns, managing editor of the Tuscaloosa News, is outgoing ALACOG president.  He handed the reins to Dale Harrison, dean of communication & journalism at Auburn University. Staying on as treasurer is Ed Mullins, the beloved University of Alabama journalism educator, founder of ALACOG,  and namesake for its award.  "The gavel moves to Auburn but the checkbook remains in Tuscaloosa," Enns said. 
   
     The state’s new meeting law has a novel penalty, if it ever is enforced.  It is “$1,000 or half the defendant's monthly salary for serving on the body."  "We are resolved to use this if we have to," said Attorney General King.   "This is a wonderful day in Alabama government." 

     Forty-one years elapsed from the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in 1964 in New York Times v. Sullivan and the enactment by Alabama of an open-meetings statute with some teeth.  Writing for the majority of the court that was finding against Montgomery city commissioner L.B. Sullivan,  who held forth a few blocks from this luncheon site, Justice William J. Brennan Jr. scorned the South’s blunting of the speech and press freedoms in the First Amendment:   "Debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open,” Brennan wrote.

The Stone decision, which 'ruined the law,' for records, still guides Jacksonville State   

      There could be more opening up of Alabama government  if Rep. Gallaher goes ahead with an October meeting  to talk about rewriting Alabama open records.  No court in the South has been as hostile to open records as Alabama's.  It turned its back on records disclosure in 1981 in Stone v. Consolidated Publishing Co.  That smashed the Anniston Star's bid to pry open records of football donors to the Jacksonville State University Foundation. 

      In effect, the court said that public officials need not comply with open-records requests that interfere  with their work.  "Yes, that case ruined the law," Brandt Ayers of the Star told me in 2003 during a workshop at the University of Alabama. 

     Al Harris, chief of the news bureau and publications office at Jacksonville State, attended this ALACOG luncheon.  We later exchanged e-mails, and I asked: "Will you ask your president to announce that the Stone decision is no longer needed?  That in the 24 years since, your school has gained efficiency to promptly answer open-records requests?" 

      He responded: "President Bill Meehan has read your e-mail of Oct. 3 and asked me to convey that Jacksonville State University operates in compliance with state and federal laws and that the university's audit is conducted by the Department of Examiners of Public Accounts. He emphasized that the JSU Foundation is an independent, nonprofit, I.R.C. Sec. 501 (c)(3) corporation that is structurally separate from Jacksonville State University. Because the foundation conducts its own affairs and operates at arm's length from the university, Dr. Meehan cannot speak for the JSU Foundation.” 

     According to the Reporters Committee site, www. rcfp.org: 

    In Louisiana, CNN stopped then-FEMA chief Michael Brown's attempt to block photographs of dead bodies in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.  U.S. Attorney Keith Wyatt read a statement Sept. 12 announcing that a task force had "no plans to bar, impede or prevent news media from newsgathering" after CNN had filed suit in U.S. District Court in Houston 

      Gov. Mike Easley of North Carolina signed a bill Sept. 22 allowing state and local governments five weeks to release details about government incentives to businesses after deals are announced….North Carolina's Court of Appeals ruled Aug. 18 that although public-hospital employees' salaries are records open for public inspection, other compensation-related records such as bonuses or severance agreements are not. 

   The South Carolina Supreme Court overturned an administrative judge’s decision to shield a doctor’s disciplinary action in a ruling announced Aug. 9. 

   The Texas Supreme Court extended the state’s libel protection to newspaper headlines in a ruling announced in June..

Tom Bennett of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution is a volunteer writer and editor of the newsletter of the Georgia First Amendment Foundation.