In The News: CT To Overhaul Transparency Laws, Investigation Details Ganim Admin REPEATEDLY Violates Open Records Law
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by 37 Mayor Joe Ganim made a campaign promise in 2015 to make Bridgeport government more transparent.
Eight years later the state of Connecticut is looking to overhaul its transparency laws for the first time in 40 years after a “Hearst Connecticut Media Group investigative series detailing how the City of Bridgeport has repeatedly violated open record laws with little repercussions, exposing how the Freedom of Information Commission (FOIC) has at times struggled to get recalcitrant government officials to promptly turn over public records.”
“We’re looking for accountability,” said Sen. Mae Flexer, co-chair of the Government Administration and Elections Committee (GAE) which oversees open records laws. “Reforms are clearly long overdue. There are clearly some people who aren’t going to do the right thing without increased penalties.”
Previous to the state taking action, Hearst Media in a February 9 article reported that “despite pledges from Mayor Joe Ganim to improve transparency, Connecticut’s most populous city has fallen into a pattern of delaying and stonewalling requests for public records — routinely in violation of state law” and that Bridgeporters have to wait years before receiving the public records they’re entitle to under the law.
“City leaders have inexplicably abandoned their own proposals to speed up the process while instituting questionable practices — including funneling requests through a centralized, understaffed office — that defy their own recommendations for improvement.”
After the February story broke, Mayor Ganim issued a statement vowing to bring the city into compliance with the law. However, “Frustration boiled over at a recent public meeting when a Bridgeport attorney told the state’s Freedom of Information Commission (FOIC), which enforces the public records law, that the city was planning to openly defy an order the commission was considering that day.”
“Over the past decade, Bridgeport has violated the state’s transparency laws more than any other municipality.”
Read ‘Unprofessional’: Bridgeport continues to try to flout CT public records law
“The repeated failures have sowed further distrust among residents of a city marred by corruption scandals, including a criminal kickback scheme that landed Ganim in prison in 2003 and prompted him to promise to make city government more open and accountable to the public when he returned to office in 2015.” According to the article titled, CT Insider article: In Bridgeport, waiting years for public records while officials break transparency laws.
