The attack on Freedom of Information in Conn.

In 1975, with the unyielding insistence of then-Gov. Ella T. Grasso, Connecticut lawmakers enacted a groundbreaking Freedom of Information law, opening up previously secretive state and local governmental operations and providing citizens with seemingly unfettered access to troves of information.

Connecticut’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) was considered so important and worthy of emulation that other states and nations around the world sought to adopt many of its facets.

Since 1975, however, groundbreaking has become ground-shaking and, in the past few years, seismic cracks have appeared in the FOIA, diluting its transparency requirements, making evasion easier and emboldening governmental entities to ignore it. Alarmingly, the pace of the FOIA’s erosion has sped up at the state Capitol and this year the law is under attack as never before.

Ironically, the assault on the FOIA has come at the same time as members of the Government Administration and Elections Committee are considering a bill that would increase the maximum penalty for certain violations of the FOIA and permit the FOIC to seek judicial relief for public agency misconduct. Meanwhile, the Appropriations Committee may try to expand the FOIC’s staff after years of inflicting debilitating budget cuts.

Although supporters of government transparency and the public’s right to know are grateful that the FOIC ‘s enforcement powers may be strengthened, it is both distressing and disappointing that the law itself is in danger of being shredded.

Upon passage of the FOIA in 1975, there were five exemptions in which public access was appropriately denied. For example, public agency executive sessions where pending litigation or certain personnel matters are discussed are off limits. Five has grown to 28 explicit exemptions and conceivably more after this year’s legislative session is concluded in June.

One of the bills under consideration would shield the addresses of a group of state and local officials, adding them to a laundry list of employees whose addresses have already been exempted from disclosure. This is being done in the name of protecting the officials’ privacy but, in reality, it is a charade.

Almost everyone’s address is available on the Internet. See for yourself. Do a Google search by typing in a name and the letters “CT” for Connecticut. In all likelihood you will find not only the person’s address, but family members and previous addresses, and quite possibly the person’s telephone number, work history and political affiliation. This bill accomplishes nothing; it is merely window dressing.

Besides, why exempt a public official’s address? It is an important bit of information in ensuring that public employees are accountable to the citizens who pay their salaries. Take for example Melissa McCaw, who last year resigned as secretary of the Office of Policy and Management and was subsequently hired by East Hartford as its finance director. A daily newspaper in the Hartford area reported that McCaw owed property taxes in Middletown. When the news was published, East Hartford required her to resolve the situation before she could assume her new job. The disclosure of McCaw’s address made accountability possible.

Much more damaging is the state’s granting of the right to supersede the FOIA in its contracts with state employee unions. This has had the insidious effect of concealing information about wrongdoing in the ranks of public officials. Examples abound, such as student complaints of sexual misconduct against university professors, cover-ups of misbehavior by state police, disciplinary measures and agency legal settlements. Government transparency should not be a bargaining chip in contract negotiations.

A proposal that has strong support in the legislature would exempt footage of the inside of a private residence from the information that police officers must make public when using body cameras. Let’s not forget that Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old Black woman, was fatally shot in her Louisville, Ky., apartment in March 2020 when at least seven police officers forced entry in her apartment as part of a drug dealing investigation. It was the wrong apartment. Subsequently, the city of Louisville paid Taylor’s family $12 million and four officers were charged with federal felonies. It would seem that having camera footage of the inside of a residence would be critical to the public’s understanding of police operations.

One overly broad bill would exempt academic research conducted by professors at publicly funded colleges and universities, and another would make disclosure of whistleblower complaints illegal. The latter is patently unnecessary because state law already exempts the disclosure of names and information in investigative files.

On it goes. Government transparency and public access to information are increasingly in peril as the cracks in the FOIA grow wider each year.

Ella Grasso must be spinning in her grave.