Joey Austin (LinkedIn)
The St Joseph School District defends its practice of charging for copies and research time associated with large requests for documents under the Missouri Sunshing Law, even if the person making the request is a member of their school board.
School board member Chris Danford made such a request and last week received notice that she would be charged nearly $150. Danford has been a vocal critic of recent practices by the district administration relating to secret and unapproved stipends, insider promotions, and contracts with outside consultants.
The school district’s Director of Communications Joey Austin says charging Danford for the documents is appropriate.
“We have received many Sunshine requests in the past few months,” Austin said in an interview. “So if it is information that we can email to a citizen who requests that we will certainly do that at no charge.
“When we get a Sunshine request and it is extensive, and it does take time to research, and make copies, scan those copies and then send, it has become appropriate for us to pass those charges on, no matter who requests the documentation.”
Even though this is a member of the school board?
“Any citizen can request information under the Sunshine Law,” Austin says. “Again, no matter who requests the information, if it is deemed excessive, if we take hours to fulfill it, if it is a large amount of copies that we need to pass that charge on, we will pass that charge on.”