In Illinois recently, the husband of a bi-county agency FOIA officer was awarded a no-bid $124,000 contract with his wife's agency. A local newspaper made a FOIA request to the agency for a copy of the agency's procurement rules.
The FOIA officer responded that “per consultation with legal counsel" there were no such rules. Subsequently, however, the board chairman of one of the counties discovered that, indeed, there were procurement rules, including provisions for competitive bidding.
A second FOIA request revealed that the agency's administrator (the FOIA officer's boss) and the agency's attorney conspired to evade disclosing the pertinent rules.
The administrator told the FOIA officer to deny the existence of procurement rules and, with knowledge that the rules did exist, the FOIA officer complied.
The county board chairman admonished the FOIA officer, “You have a duty to answer to the public in an honest fashion, and you didn’t do that. This is a bold-faced lie.”
This stuff happens, folks, and more often than most of us would like to think. I don't know what, if anything, will come of this incident, but one thing is clear. When people like the FOIA officer in this case, her boss and the agency's attorney spend some time behind bars for their criminal (this is classic RICO) deceit, these types of abuses will be less frequent.
UPDATE (9-19-13): It is reported that the FOIA officer in question has announced that she will step down 9-27-13. Also reported, there may have been other instances of fraud in the bi-county health department under scrutiny. A forensic audit is anticipated.
http://www.paxtonrecord.net/news/health/health-care/2013-09-17/health-department-foia-officertobacco-coordinator-resigns.html
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