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Minutes from the last meeting
Annual Business Meeting 2010
Friday,
Sept. 24, 2010
The Iowa State Historical Building, 600 E. Locust,
Des Moines, Iowa
Presiding: Dave Vickers, KROS Radio, president
Attending: Ferne Bonomi
(Ames); Randy Brubaker (Des Moines Register); Wayne Davis (Ames);
Kay Henderson (Radio Iowa/Iowa Broadcast News Association); Karen
Kaiser (Associated Press, guest); Keith Luchtel (Nyemaster, IBA and
Iowa Newspaper Association); Angela McBride (Iowa Citizens’ Aide/Ombudsman);
Dan Miller (Iowa Public Television); Chris Mudge (INA); Carol Riha
(AP); Scott Sundstrom (IBA/INA); Sue Toma (IBA); Dave Witke (Des
Moines Register retired), Dawn Work-MaKinne (Iowa Library Association)
Recording Secretary: Kathleen Richardson, IFOIC executive secretary, Drake University.
Minutes of 2010 executive committee meetings and 2009 annual meeting: Unanimously approved.
Report on activities of 2010 and continuing
projects:
• Open Meetings, Open Records Handbook, 14th
edition: Richardson
reported that the handbook will be updated early in 2011. Copies
will be sent to member organizations; if you want extra copies, please
contact Richardson.
• FOI training: The Council is working with the
Iowa Newspaper Foundation to apply for a grant from the National
FOI Coalition to conduct joint open meetings/records training with
the government associations in 2011. The training will be done via
Webinar, and there will probably be separate Webinars on meetings
and records. This training is aimed at government employees who are
unable to attend out-of-town conventions and other training.
• Web
site: FOI Council Web site was updated this year, so if your organization’s
site has a link to the IFOIC site, it might need to be updated. The
site also links to a blog that will provide updates on current FOI
issues, news and events in Iowa. Please feed Richardson info for
the blog.
• Judicial retention Webinars: The FOI Council has co-sponsored
two Webinars to help educate Iowa journalists about the Iowa merit
selection system for choosing judges. • Legal: The Openness Defense
Fund supported two legal initiatives this year — an amicus brief
in support of the Iowa City Press-Citizen’s lawsuit to force the
U of Iowa to turn over records related to a sexual assault, and a
brief to support the State’s appeal of a judge’s order to expunge
a woman’s arrest records from government electronic databases.
•
Legislative report: Mudge, Luchtel and Sundstrom discussed efforts
in the past legislative session to achieve creation of a state-level
agency to enforce the open meetings and records laws. Efforts have
failed in the Iowa House for the past three years, so the INA is
considering amending its position to propose an agency that would
provide opinions that are educational and persuasive but not binding.
Such a procedure would be more streamlined, less bureaucratic and
cheaper. Members discussed that the fall’s election may have an impact
on the legislative outlook for an access agency; Republican gubernatorial
candidate Terry Branstad has made transparency one of the benchmarks
of his candidacy. McBride encouraged the Council to keep in contact
with the ombudsman’s office, which is willing to collaborate on legislative
initiatives.
Financial report: Richardson summarized the 2010 financial report thus far. Mediacom did not pay its dues this year as a sustaining member, but this has occurred occasionally in the past. Next year the Council will have the expense of updating its handbook. The 2011 budget will be finalized and approved at the first meeting of the Executive Committee in January.
Discussion of goals for 2011: The
Council bylaws require the trustees to annually adopt goals for the
upcoming year. The group approved the following goals for 2011: •
To continue as the Iowa Supreme-court designed coordinator for Expanded
Media Coverage in the Iowa courts.
• To remain active in the discussions
of Chapters 21 and 22 in the Iowa Legislature.
• To continue to seek
establishment of an FOI agency during the next legislative session.
• To protect against erosion of access to currently available government
information. • To make next year “The Year of the Engaged Citizen”
by focusing efforts on educating the public about the importance
of open government.
• To undertake other projects and activities
as needed. The group discussed two public-oriented projects for Sunshine
Week in March: • An education program aimed at Iowa schoolchildren.
Both the INA and IPTV expressed interest in collaborating.
• A Powerpoint
presentation that members could use for presentations in their communities.
Bonomi will brush off the public relations campaign that she proposed
for the Council several years ago, based on personal interaction
and grassroots education efforts.
Introduction of officers for 2010:
• Randy Brubaker, The Des Moines Register, from first vice president
to president.
• Steve Delaney, Burlington Hawk Eye, from second vice
president to first vice president, representing the Iowa Newspaper
Association.
• Joel McCrea, WHO/Clear Channel, joining the executive
committee as second vice president, representing the Iowa Broadcasters
Association.
• Carol Riha, Associated Press, continuing as Working
Press Trustee.
• Kate Thompson, Algona Publishing, joining the executive
committee as Working Press Trustee.
The group thanked retiring president
Dave Vickers for his years of work on the Council executive committee.
